THE Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has announced that the country’s external reserves climbed to $43.05 billion as of September 11, 2025, marking a notable increase from $40.
51 billion recorded at the end of July.
CBN Governor, Olayemi Cardoso, disclosed this during a press briefing in Abuja yesterday following the 302nd Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) meeting held on September 22 and 23.
According to him, the reserves now provide an import cover of 8.28 months.
He further noted that Nigeria’s current account balance recorded a surplus of $5.28 billion in the second quarter of 2025, up from $2.85 billion in the first quarter.
On the ongoing recapitalisation exercise, Cardoso confirmed that 14 banks have successfully met the new capital requirements introduced by the apex bank earlier this year.
The new thresholds are structured by licence category: commercial banks with international authorisation must now hold a minimum capital base of ₦500 billion, while those with national and regional authorisations require ₦200 billion and ₦50 billion respectively.
Merchant banks are required to maintain ₦50 billion, national non-interest banks ₦20 billion, and regional non-interest banks ₦10 billion.
This is the first major recapitalisation exercise since 2004, when the CBN raised the minimum capital requirement from ₦2 billion to ₦25 billion, a move that triggered major consolidation in the banking sector and reduced the number of banks from 89 to 25.
Meanwhile, the CBN also announced a reduction in the Monetary Policy Rate (MPR), lowering it by 50 basis points from 27.5 per cent to 27 per cent.