Nigeria's Ecobank raise closes $170 mln loan

Nigeria's unit of Ecobank Transnational Incorporation (ETI) has signed a $170 million loan, marking only the second internationally syndicated loan this year for a Nigerian bank, as depressed oil prices bite into the country’s liquidity.  Standard Chartered acted as sole coordinator and documentation agent on the deal, which raised $20 million more than the borrower's inaugural $150 million October 2014 facility that it refinances.despite the adverse market conditions, Ecobank also managed to attract four new lenders into the syndicate group,...

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Nigeria naira firmer on unofficial market as c.bank tightens forex rules

The Nigerian naira strengthened 2.1 percent to 235 per dollar on the unofficial market on Thursday after the central bank moved to enforce documentation requirements on bureau de change operators prior to dollar sales, traders said. Dollars In a circular seen by Reuters on Thursday, the central bank asked all bureau de change (BDCs) operators to submit accounts showing their dollar usage at the start of each week before they can access future sales,...

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Oil falls as spotlight returns to glut, dollar up

Crude oil futures fell back towards $45 per barrel on Wednesday as the dollar gained and investor focus shifted back to a deep global supply glut.Brent was down 94 cents at $45.18 a barrel at 1241 GMT, having touched a low of $45.11. The benchmark hit its highest since Nov. 11 at $46.50 on Tuesday after Turkey shot down a Russian jet. It had risen for five consecutive days, its longest run of positive sessions since April.U.S. West Texas Intermediate...

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AfDB chief says Africa needs to manage budgets carefully

African countries will have to manage their finances carefully to repay dollar debt raised in recent years as weak currencies push up servicing costs and oil and commodity revenues tumble, the new head of the African Development Bank said. Adesina From oil-rich Nigeria and copper producing Zambia to fast-growing Rwanda and Ghana, African nations have taken advantage of historically low yields and strong investor appetite to issue Eurobonds or raise...

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Nigeria to raise 129 bln naira in Treasury bills

Nigeria plans to raise 129.17 billion naira ($649.10 million)worth of local currency denominated treasury bills with maturities range of 3-month and 1-year on Dec. 2, the central bank said on Wednesday.The bank said it will issue 17.85 billion naira worth in the 3-month paper, 18 billion naira in the 6-month paper and 93.32 billion naira in the 1-year bill, using the Dutch Auction System.Yields on Nigeria's bonds fell below 10 percent across maturities as trading started on Wednesday, traders said, a day after the central bank announced a surprise...

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Nigeria's northern Zamfara state sells 7 bln naira bond at 17 pct

Nigeria's Zamfara State has issued a seven-year bond at a fixed rate of 17 percent to raise 7 billion naira ($35 million) for infrastructure projects, the lead issuing house FBN Capital said on Wednesday.The northwestern Nigerian state, which relies on agriculture launched a 30 billion naira debt programme to help it develop its infrastructure, its advisers said, adding that the first tranche was underwritten on a standby basis.Bond yields fell below 10 percent across maturities as secondary market trading started on Wednesday, a day after the...

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Ghana producer inflation falls to 2.8 pct in October

Ghana's producer price inflation fell to 2.8 percent in October from a revised 4.8 percent in September, continuing a downward trend, the statistics office said on Wednesday. Ghana flag The fall reflects apparent progress for the West African country in stabilizing inflation."The easing effect came mainly from the manufacturing of petroleum and coke which registered a significant price decline," Ghana's acting deputy statistician Anthony Amuzu...

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AfDB Group signs loan agreement with Nigeria's LAPO Microfinance Bank

The African Development Bank Group (AfDB) and LAPO Microfinance Bank Ltd. signed a loan agreement for Nigerian Naira 2.364 billion (approximately $12 million) on November 17, 2015 to support inclusive growth in Nigeria and also support local SMEs in the country.LAPO MfB is the largest microfinance bank in Nigeria with 1.1 million clients and 327 branches currently operating in 26 out of 36 states in the country. Given its history of a group-lending model based on a community-based approach, LAPO predominantly focuses on low-income households and...

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Why Nigeria's rate cut may not yield right results - NKC African Economics

The policy committee of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) convened on Tuesday, and defied our expectation by loosening the monetary policy stance. The growthoriented monetary regulator opted to cut the policy rate by 200 bps to 11%, stating that “we must stimulate growth.” In addition, the interest rate corridor was widened to 700 bps below the policy rate, and 200 bps above the policy rate. While the strong emphasis on economic growth does not come as a surprise – CBN Governor Godwin Emefiele’s tenure was kicked off with controversial growth-oriented...

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Nigeria bond yields fall below 10 pct after central bank rate cut

Yields on Nigeria's bonds fell below 10 percent as markets opened on Wednesday, traders said, a day after a surprise central bank interest rate cut. Bond yields had traded above 11 percent across maturities on Tuesday, with the benchmark 20-year bond trading at 12.30 perce...

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Why Nigeria's Cbank lower interest rate - bankers

The central bank of Nigeria (CBN) on Tuesday lowered its benchmark interest rare to 11 percent from from 13 percent, the first of such in six years, bankers said the decision to cut rate was already anticipated in view of prevailing market condition, but were surprised by the 200 basis points slashed. Emefiele, CBN boss  Interbank interest rate has eased to a new low of one percent for overnight lending due to the injection of liquidity...

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Nigeria central bank cuts benchmark interest rate from 13 to 11 pct - governor

Nigeria’s central bank unspectedly at its MPC meeting on Tuesday slashed its benchmark interest rate to 11 percent from 13 percent in its bid to boost lending to real sector of the economy and growing employment in the economy. The bank said members of the rate-fixing Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) voted 8 against 2 in favour of the reduction in lending rate. Godwin Emefiele, who announced the measure at the end of the two day meeting said the  corridor around the MPR has been adjusted to +200 above and -700 points below the benchmark rate,...

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Iran's president calls for closer ties with Bolivia, Nigeria, Algeria

Iran's President Hassan Rouhani held separate meetings with visiting presidents of Bolivia and Nigeria and Algeria's prime minister, calling for expansion of ties between Tehran and the three countries, Rouhani's official website president.ir reported on 24 November.In his meeting with Bolivian President Evo Morales, the Iranian president said that Tehran is prepared to boost relations with Caracas in all areas. President Buhari "Iran and Bolivia...

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South Africa's Eskom says not 'desperate' to issue global bond

South Africa's utility Eskom is not desperate to raise money through the sale of international bonds, its chief executive said on Tuesday, as the firm has enough funding to build its new coal-fired power stations. Power grid Eskom, which reported a 22 percent rise in half-year profit, is building the coal-fired Kusile and Medupi power stations to ease an energy crunch in Africa's most advanced economy."We don't have to do a global bond issue. We...

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Nigerian naira eases on parallel mkt after cbank cut dollar supply-traders

Nigeria's naira currency eased 2.17 percent against the dollar on the parallel market on Monday after the central bank cut dollar supply to bureaux de change operators in a bid to conserve forex reserves, traders said.The local currency traded at 235 to the dollar on the parallel market compared with 230 a dollar on Friday, but remained unchanged at 197 to the dollar on the official interbank market."The central bank has reduced the amount of dollar sold to bureaux de change at its twice-weekly intervention, which has also been cut to once a week...

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Nigeria MPC meeting: Why we support retention of MPR at 13 pct - NKC Africa

The Nigerian financial system has been awashed with liquidity since the end of September. The excess system liquidity is partially attributable to large redemptions of open market operation (OMOs) instruments (without adequate new issuance to absorb the excess liquidity) and a reduction in the Cash Reserve Requirement (CRR) in September. The additional liquidity that flooded the market sent the overnight lending rate plunging, according to Reuters...

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Mitsubishi Motors plans Nigerian assembly plant in next year-executive

Mitsubishi Motors Corp expects to open an assembly plant in Nigeria in the next year, joining the growing list of carmakers setting up local assembly plants in the west African nation, the Japanese group's regional head told Reuters. "It's still in negotiation - you can say in the third round out of 10," Anand Singh, the regional head in west Africa, said. "We have identified the land. Now we are waiting for some clearances from customs, finance ministry ... so that's the status."Analysts say the auto market in Africa's biggest economy has huge...

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Nigeria hopes to reach rice mill deal with China by year-end

Nigeria hopes to reach a deal with China within weeks to set up 40 rice mills, its new agriculture minister said, as part of plans to eliminate the need for any imports of the grain within two years. Audu Ogbeh said in his first interview since taking office last week that Africa's top oil exporter wants to boost production of tomatoes, soy beans, nuts and plant two million cocoa trees to reduce an annual food import bill of $20 billion and create jobs for its impoverished youth. President Muhammadu Buhari, who took office in May on a campaign...

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Nigerian interbank rate rises on drop in liquidity

Nigeria's interbank lending rate rose to 1 percent on secured lending on Friday from 0.5 percent previously, amid drop in banking system liquidity on the back of foreign exchange and treasury bills purchases, traders said.Traders said the central bank has also failed to update data on commercial lenders cash balance since Monday, putting most dealers in the dark about the volume of liquidity available in the market to trade with. Emefiele, CBN...

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Why we kick against fixed FX exchange regime –NKC Africa

NIGERIA raised N120bn in Treasury bills at an auction held on Wednesday. Marginal rates continued to ease on the back of high system liquidity. We have been highly critical of the direction monetary policy in Nigeria has taken since the ousting of Mr Lamido Sanusi (former central bank governor), and recent conduct has done little to soothe our concerns. One of our main critiques against the rigid exchange rate regime is the costs to growth as the...

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Nigeria central bank orders 3 banks to recapitalise by June

Nigeria's central bank has given three commercial banks until June 2016 to recapitalise after they failed to hit a minimum capital adequacy rate of 10 percent, it said in a report on its website.The central bank did not name the banks but said they were from the group of 14 in Africa's biggest economy that have licenses to operate as regional and national lenders, with respective capital bases of 10 billion naira ($50 million) and 25 billion naira. Emefiele,...

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Wema Bank to issue bonds, shares after getting national bank status

Oloketuyi Nigeria's Wema Bank said on Thursday it would resume plans for a share sale to fund growth and has also started a process to raise $100 million worth of naira bonds after getting approval to switch from a regional to a national bank.Wema Bank said in April it aimed to complete a $100 million seven-year dollar Tier 2 bond issue by the second quarter this year to fund its growing dollar loan book and also issue fresh equity of up to 40...

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IFC study examines reasons mobile money customers are often inactive

The International Finance Corporation (IFC), a member of the World Bank Group, on Thursday published a research study looking at why a large portion of registered users of digital financial services never or only rarely use the service.The corporation said the phenomenon is observed in many emerging markets, posing a key challenge to the expansion of financial inclusion.The study, The Mobile Banking Customer That Isn’t: Drivers of Digital Financial Services Inactivity in Côte d’Ivoire, is based on research in the largest digital financial services...

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Nigeria sells 120 bln naira in T-bills at lower yields

Nigeria sold 119.92 billion naira ($600 million) in Treasury bills with maturities from three months to a year at an auction on Wednesday, with yields further slashed compared with returns at the previous auctions, the central bank said on Thursday. Emefiele, CBN boss The result of the auction showed that the bank sold 32.43 billion naira worth of three-month paper at 5.34 percent compared with 5.82 percent at the Nov. 4 auction. It also sold...

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Nigeria's oil output could fall by 2017 unless investments boosted-Moody

Nigeria's oil output could drop by as much as 15 percent by 2017 unless the government attracts more investment and resolves cash shortages at state oil firms, a senior Moody's analyst said on Wednesday. Africa's biggest economy produces about 2.1 million barrels per day of oil with foreign and local companies through production sharing contracts and joint ventures. President Buhari But projects have been held up because state-oil firm NNPC needs...

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Nigeria economy expands as oil output grows

Nigeria’s economy, the largest in Africa, expanded at a slightly faster pace in the third quarter as oil production increased, latest data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) showed. Barrel of oil The nation Gross Domestic Product (GDP) rose 2.8 percent from a year ago, compared with 2.4 percent in the second quarter and 6.2 percent in the same period of 2014, the NBS data showed. It said oil output jumped to 2.17 million barrels a day...

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Ford's Nigerian plant turns out first vehicle

Ford Motor Co's new Nigerian assembly plant has built its first model and will produce an initial 10 vehicles a day for the domestic market, the U.S.-based carmaker said on Tuesday. One of Ford Motors plants The company said in August it would start the assembly of its best-selling Ford Ranger pickup trucks in Nigeria, as it expands in Africa and the Middle East.The auto market in Africa's biggest economy has huge potential but only a small number...

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Nigeria finalises fourth-quarter gasoline allocations as fuel queues return

Nigeria has issued its final allocations for subsidised gasoline imports for the fourth quarter at 1.41 million tonnes, traders and a senior source at the state-run fuel supply regulator said on Tuesday.The West African nation imports the bulk of its gasoline requirement because of its dilapidated refining system, which President Muhammadu Buhari is keen to revive, though delayed subsidy payments and the low availability of dollars in the economy...

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