By John Ikani
As world powers perfect plans to tame persistently high inflation through tightening monetary policies, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has explained that such policies – which include interest rate hikes – will not affect the Nigerian economy.
Governor of the apex bank, Godwin Emefiele gave the explanation on Tuesday while addressing members of the press after the Monetary Policy Communiques (MPC) reading.
According to him, advanced economies are only raising interest rates because they are facing a significant uptick in inflationary pressure, whilst Nigeria has been witnessing moderations except for December 2021, which he said is temporary.
“Flows from the advanced economy did not move into the Nigerian economy, fortunately during the period of stimulus release by world central banks, we witnessed a reversal in our portfolio investments as they feel our yields are not as desirable,” Emefiele said.
Emefiele went on to reveal that the MPC has voted to keep interest rates low in order to support Nigeria’s economy’s growth.
The central bank voted to keep the MPR at 11.5%, leaving the asymmetric corridor of +100/-700 basis points around the MPR, retained CRR at 27.5%, while liquidity ratio was left at 30%.
