FG Moves To Digitise Forex Transactions
The federal government has commenced arrangements to automate transactions in the foreign exchange market to tame the spike in forex.
The Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Wale Edun, who disclosed this during the first-panel session at the 29th Nigeria Economic Summit, said all dealings in the fx market, from the official to the money changers where huge arbitrage has consistently occurred, will be thoroughly monitored and offenders fished out and punished.
He also disclosed that President Bola Tinubu had signed two executive orders last week.
One of them is an executive order that allows forbearance for all the cash in the economy to come in and formally boost the money supply legally.
There’s another executive order that allows domestic issuance of foreign currency issues so that it will allow incentive to provide that foreign exchange for whatever source.
He said: “Foreign exchange market will be simplified and reformed such that all legal and legitimate transactions will fall within the purview of the authorities and in the formal foreign exchange market. Anything outside that will be illegal, a criminal offense and will be punished,”
Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Yemi Cardoso, also said the plan is to have a foreign market that is fit for purpose and works for everybody, which can be predictable and with no opacity.
“We are going to come out with an elegant document that will tell you the rules,” he said.