Friday, January 13, 2023: The Nigerian Investors and Exporters (I&E) FX Window closed the trading session on a bearish note, with the naira depreciating to close at N461.90/$1 from the previous day’s closing price of N440. This represents a decrease of 4.4 percent.
An exchange rate of N440/$ was the lowest rate recorded during the intra-day trading before it settled at N461.90/$ at the end of the trading session, while it also traded as high as 462.00/$ during intra-day trading. According to data from FMDQ, a total of $82.38 million was traded at the Investors and Exporters (I&E) Window for the reporting period, representing a decrease of $500 thousand from the $82.88 million traded the previous day.
On the parallel (black) market, the exchange rate between the naira and the US dollar was stable on Friday, January 13, 2023, to trade at an average of N741/$1 on the black market, following the first week of 2023 on an unstable trend. The naira is stable compared with the previous day’s trading rate, when the naira was traded at N741/$ on Thursday, January 12, 2023. Trading activities at the B2B market show that the exchange rate closed at about N741/$ for the same period being reported. This is based on information obtained from forex marketers in Lagos.
FOREIGN RESERVES
According to data from the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), the gross foreign reserve ticked up to $37.21 billion as of January 11, 2023, increasing by $4.9 million (0.013 percent) from $37.20 billion recorded on January 10, 2023. The foreign reserve has shown a steady increase in the first trading week of January 2023.
CRYPTOCURRENCIES
In 2022, hackers and scammers cost cryptocurrency investors $3.9 billion worldwide. Rate Captain delved deeply to comprehend the origins and drivers of the losses. According to a breakdown of the losses, fraud losses in 2022 were $174.9 million over 34 distinct instances, while hacking losses totaled $3.7 billion across 134 distinct occurrences.
Four distinct projects—Ronin Network, BNB Chain, Wormhole, and FTX—lost the majority of the money that was lost to fraud. However, the research notes that the loss was less than what thieves and hackers took from cryptocurrency investors in 2021. The amount in 2022 is down 51.2% from the $8.08 billion that thieves and hackers stole in 2021. In 2022, hacks continued to be the predominant cause of losses as compared to frauds, scams, and rug pulls. Fraud accounted for only 4.4% of the total losses in 2022, while hacks accounted for 95.6%.
