CBN Reduces Bond Issuance By N5bn, Blames Covid-19 Crisis

The Central Bank of Nigeria has lost N5.5bn on low Open Market Operations auction as Covid-19 reduced the level of auction to N6.4bn in the first half of this year.

The half year result represents a plunge in auction level compared to the N11.9bn recorded in the first half of 2019.

Nigeria’s apex bank disclosed the development in its recently published half year result for 2020.

The regulator blamed the phased reduction in auction on the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic which it said culminated in low level of activity in OMO.

The Central Bank said public subscription and OMO sale  amounted to N8.5bn and N6.5bn, respectively, compared with N13.1bn and N11.8bn, subscribed to and allotted, in the corresponding half of 2019.

CBN said that consequently between January to June,  the cost of liquidity management reduced by 48.7 per cent below the level in the corresponding period of 2019.

During the period, the tenors of OMO auction ranged from 64 to 364 days, at stop rates of 9.12 per cent.

CBN OMO tenure in the same period of 2019 ranged between 27 to 364 days, at a stop rate of 13.03 per cent.