Business

Currency In Circulation Drops To N1.38tn – CBN

Published

2 years ago

February 28, 2023

The total amount of currency-in-circulation in the country dropped from N3.29tn as of the end of October 2022 to N1.38tn as of the end of January 2023 as a result of the naira redesign policy of the Central Bank of Nigeria.

Figures obtained from the CBN showed this represents a drop of N1.91tn in the three-month period.

The Governor, CBN, Godwin Emefiele, had in October 2022, announced plans to redesign the old N200, N500 and N1,000 notes.

Emefiele also announced deadlines for Nigerians to swap their old with the new notes.

The banking sector regulator said, “Accordingly, all Deposit Money Banks currently holding the existing denominations of the currency may begin returning these notes back to the CBN effective immediately. The newly designed currency will be released to the banks in the order of first-come-first-serve basis.

“Customers of banks are enjoined to begin paying into their bank accounts the existing currency to enable them to withdraw the new banknotes once circulation begins.”

He decried the challenges associated with currency management including significant hoarding of banknotes by members of the public, with statistics showing that over 80 per cent of currency-in-circulation was outside the vaults of commercial banks.

Other challenges, he added included shortage of clean and fit banknotes with attendant negative perception of the CBN and increased risk to financial stability; and increasing ease and risk of counterfeiting evidenced by several security reports.

In recent years, he said, the CBN had recorded significantly higher rates of counterfeiting especially at the higher denominations of N500 and N1,000 banknotes.

Although the global best practice was for central banks to redesign, produce and circulate new local legal tender every five to eight years, he said, the naira had not been redesigned in the last 20 years.

“On the basis of these trends, problems, and facts, and in line with Sections 19, Subsections A and B of the CBN Act 2007, the management of the CBN sought and obtained the approval of the President to redesign, produce, and circulate new series of banknotes at N100, N200, N500, and N1,000 levels,” Emefiele said.

Before the currency redesign plan of the CBN, huge figure of currency in circulation was recorded.

According to the CBN, the currency in circulation rose by N58.36bn to N2.84tn in September 2022 from N2.79tn in August.

The currency in circulation rose to N2.81tn in July, 2022 from N2.74tn at the end of June, 2022. It fell to N2.79tn in May from about N2.80tn at the end of April.

Currency-in-circulation is defined as currency outside the vaults of the central bank; that is, all legal tender currency in the hands of the general public and in the vaults of the Deposit Money Banks, according to the apex bank.

The CBN stated that it employed the “accounting/statistical/withdrawals and deposits approach” to compute the currency in circulation in Nigeria.

This approach involved tracking the movements in currency in circulation on a transaction-by-transaction basis.

It said for every withdrawal made by a DMB at one of CBN’s branches, an increase in the CIC was recorded, adding that for every deposit made by a DMB at one of CBN’s branches, a decrease in the CIC was recorded.

The transactions are all recorded in the CBN’s CIC account, and the balance on the account at any point in time represents the country’s currency in circulation.

According to the apex bank, analysis of the currency in circulation showed that a large and increasing proportion of the naira outside the commercial banking system was held by the general public who hoard a lot of the new banknotes.

Business

Naira Continues To Appreciate Against Dollar On Official Market

Published

2 days ago

August 1, 2025

Editor

The naira continued its appreciation against the dollar at the foreign exchange market on Tuesday.

Accordingly, the naira strengthened further to N1,533.18 against the dollar on Tuesday, from N1,534.21 traded the previous day.

This represents a gain of N1.03 against the dollar on a day-to-day basis and marks the second consecutive day of appreciation at the official FX market.

Meanwhile, on the black market, the naira depreciated further to N1,545 per dollar on Tuesday from N1,537 traded on Monday.

Recall that the naira had similarly closed Monday’s trading session with mixed sentiments, recording gains at the official market but depreciating at the parallel market.

Business

Dangote Refinery Gets New CEO

Published

2 days ago

August 1, 2025

Editor

The Dangote Petroleum Refinery and Petrochemicals has appointed David Bird, the former head of Oman’s Duqm Refinery, as its new Chief Executive Officer.

A report by S&P global on Friday said, Bird heads the refinery’s petroleum and petrochemicals division in a strategic move to overcome production challenges and advance its next wave of expansion.

Effective from July 2025, the former Shell head of operations at its Balau Pokom refinery stepped in as CEO of the Dangote Group’s fuels and petrochemicals business, which commissioned the world’s largest single-train refinery last year.

Our correspondent also observed that the CEO participated at the just concluded Dangote Leadership Development Program Graduation Ceremony.

The appointment signals the company’s renewed focus on scaling production, streamlining operations, and positioning itself as a dominant force in Africa’s refining and petrochemical landscape.

The report read, “Nigeria’s Dangote Group has appointed the former head of Oman’s Duqm refinery as CEO of its petroleum and petrochemicals business as it strives to overcome production challenges and advance its next wave of expansion.”

It, however, noted that the Dangote Group founder Aliko Dangote, will remain as chairman of the refining business and CEO of the wider conglomerate, which is also active in cement, fertilizers and sugar refining.

The business is expected to tap Bird’s experience expanding the Duqm refinery and diversifying its crude slate as CEO of OQ8, a role he adopted months before the Omani complex began its first test runs in 2023.

Commenting on his appointment, Bird said his focus at Dangote will involve advancing the group’s footprint beyond the Nigerian market and across the African continent.

As CEO of the refining business, he will be responsible for ensuring maximum output and efficiency for the refinery, and aims to make the group a leader in the global market, a LinkedIn update noted.

The appointment comes after a string of unit upsets and “design issues” that have stalled the ramp-up process of the 650,000-b/d refinery, while its leadership has called out a hostile business environment for challenging its operations.

Since it was commissioned in January 2024, Dangote has quickly grown its market share in the Nigerian fuel sector, displacing large volumes of gasoline imports that the country once relied on.

However, Aliko Dangote has railed against “rent-seeking” trade partners and substandard fuel imports for putting strain on the business.

In a previous interview with Platts, Bird emphasised a trading-led approach to achieve a competitive edge in the refining sector, with a focus on high utilisation rates, efficiency and feedstock flexibility.

His approach aligns with a recent shift from the Dangote complex to process a wider range of crude grades, partially spurred by limited availability of the Nigerian oil it was designed to process.

However, the Nigerian refinery is still obliged to sell fixed volumes of its oil products into the domestic crude market under a naira-based trade agreement with the Nigerian National Petroleum Company, a 7.2 per cent stakeholder in the business.

As the Dangote Group eyes its next wave of growth, it plans to expand the capacity of the Lagos refinery to 700,000 barrels per day, build out port infrastructure and establish foreign storage assets in Namibia and other countries.

In August, it is set to roll out its own distribution business with a fleet of 4,000 CNG-powered trucks.

Dangote Group officials have also shared ambitions to list the refining business on the London and Lagos stock exchanges, and Aliko Dangote reiterated plans to take the business public.

After years of setbacks and budget challenges, the speed of the refinery’s ramp-up in 2024 caught many analysts by surprise, and the complex quickly began exerting pressure on global oil benchmarks as it began exporting its products.

Yet despite beginning test runs on its main gasoline outlet, the residue fluid catalytic cracker, in Q3 2024, the company has since suffered repeated outages on the unit in 2025, forcing it to rely on its lower-yield reformer and sacrifice output over extended periods.

Speaking to Platts earlier in July, a Dangote executive said the RFCC was running at 85 per cent. He denied reports that the company will undergo a planned turnaround on the unit in December.

According to S&P Global Commodities at Sea data, Nigeria exported some 220,000 b/d of petroleum products in July 2025, when outages at NNPC facilities made Dangote the country’s only active refiner.

The complex exported 30,000 b/d of residual fuel, a refining byproduct which would normally be kept on site for further processing in the RFCC under normal operations.

Exports continue to be dominated by jet fuel, which accounted for 45 per cent of total shipments, and gasoil with a 24 per cent share.

Business

Petrol Tankers To Stop Loading Beyond 45,000 Litres By October 1 – IPMAN

Published

2 days ago

August 1, 2025

Editor

The Western Zone of the Independent Petroleum Marketers Association of Nigeria has said tankers will no longer load more than 45,000 litres of the product from October 1.

The Chairman of the zone, Chief Oyewole Akanni, disclosed this in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria in Ibadan on Friday.

Akanni stated that the measure was adopted in a joint meeting involving IPMAN, the government and other stakeholders, held to reduce the cases of petroleum tanker accidents.

The stakeholders, he said, are the Petroleum Tanker Drivers, Nigerian Association of Road Transport Owners, the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority and oil marketers.

He said, “Before now, some tankers carried up to 90,000 or 60,000 litres, which was dangerous.

“Those big tankers damage our roads, as the trucks are made to carry far more than they were designed for.

“And when overloaded, they become unstable and fall, causing accidents.”

Akanni stated that the government had also mandated all tankers to install safety covers that prevent spillage in the event of a crash.

“With these covers, even if a tanker falls, fuel won’t spill, except if the tank is punctured,” he said.

He, however, lamented the activities of vandals, who deliberately puncture fallen tankers to steal fuel, describing it as a major challenge.

The IPMAN chairman also said that PTD discovered that most accidents occurred at night due to fatigue.

“We have, therefore, instructed drivers not to drive at night.

“Once it is 7.00 p.m., they must park and continue their journey by 7.00 a.m. the next day, but some still disobey this directive,” he said.

Akanni assured that IPMAN would continue to work with stakeholders to ensure that tanker-related accidents were minimised.

He said that the spate of fatalities had triggered federal interventions, calling for stricter regulations, mass education, and enforced safety reforms.

According to Akanni, the incidents form part of a broader wave of tanker disasters across Nigeria.

“These are marked by systemic failures, including overloading, poor infrastructure, inadequate enforcement, alongside dangerous public practices like fuel scooping,” he said.

NAN