The governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Mr. Olayemi Cardoso, has declared that the remaining backlog of foreign exchange (FX) transactions held by the bank is slated for clearance within the next few days, possibly within a week and a half.
During a Foreign Portfolio Investor call organised by the Nigerian Exchange Group (NGX) alongside the CBN team, Governor Cardoso emphasised that recent reforms have been implemented with the specific aim of addressing distortions in the foreign exchange market.
Responding to queries regarding the current magnitude of the Forex backlogs and the steps being taken to resolve them, Governor Cardoso affirmed that the CBN has already completed the clearance of its Forex backlog across all banks except for five, with plans to address these remaining cases imminently.
He stated,”Basically what we have done with those is we have paid as much as we can to the point where we have cleared the backlog of all the banks save five. All the bank’s genuine and verifiable backlogs have been cleared save five.
“We are confident that we will shortly be in a position where the whole issue of forwards would be behind us. I would say in the next few days we should be in a position where the balance of the five would have been put behind us.
“I have tried as much as possible to be consistent on this matter. I don’t make promises I don’t fulfil. The last time I spoke on this matter, I was confident that within one month, we would be more or less out of it and I’m saying again that right now I think in the course of the next few days maybe a week and a half, this should be put behind us.”
Providing additional context, Governor Cardoso highlighted during a press briefing following the first Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) meeting that the CBN had cleared an additional $400 million from the backlog. Based on publicised clearance estimates, this action reduces the remaining backlog to approximately $1.8 billion.
