Naira Down to N1,504/$1 at Official Market, N1,580/$1 at Black Market

However, the domestic currency improved its value against the Pound Sterling at the official market yesterday by N12.78 to wrap the session at N1,855.98/£1 compared with the preceding day’s N1,868.76/£1 and against the Euro, it gained N9.36 to trade at N1,545.82/€1, in contrast to Monday’s closing price of N1,555.18/€1.

A look at the black market segment of the forex market showed that the Nigerian Naira weakened against the greenback on Tuesday by N10 to sell for N1,580/$1 compared with the previous day’s value of N1,570/$1.

Meanwhile, the cryptocurrency market was down yesterday after comments by the US Federal Reserve’s chairman, Mr Jerome Powell, dampened the market. 

Appearing before the US Senate Banking Committee, Mr Powell said he is worried about concerns over the debanking trend plaguing the crypto industry and is already tweaking internal supervision policies at the central bank.

He also suggested that crypto stablecoins may have a big future and he supports work on regulation for them, a move that defeats the entire deregulation appeal of cryptocurrencies.

The Fed chair then said the US economy is in a good place and saw no reason to rush ahead with further rate cuts.

At the digital currency market yesterday, Litecoin (LTC) fell by 8.8 per cent to $117.63, Dogecoin (DOGE) depreciated by 4.3 per cent to sell at $0.2534, Solana (SOL) also slumped 4.3 per cent to trade at $195.57, and Ethereum (ETH) slid by 3.6 per cent to quote at $2,609.42.

In addition, Cardano (ADA) went down by 3.5 per cent to settle at $0.767, Ripple (XRP) dropped 3.4 per cent to finish at $2.41, Bitcoin (BTC) shrank by 2.3 per cent to $95,907.63, Binance Coin (BNB) depreciated by 0.6 per cent to $633.65, and the US Dollar Tether (USDT) slumped by 0.03 per cent to $0.9999, while the US Dollar Coin (USDC) remained unchanged at $1.00.