Flight to Dollars a Risk as Nigeria Replaces High-Value Currency
- Naira plunges to new low at official and unauthorized markets
- Move could hamper growth, says economic adviser to president
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Nigeria’s move to replace high-value currency notes from December may exacerbate dollar demand in the country, which rations foreign-exchange, and put further pressure on the naira, according to an economic adviser to President Muhammadu Buhari.
Africa’s most-populous nation plans to issue redesigned 200-, 500- and 1,000-naira notes and asked residents to change the bills by Jan. 31, when they will cease to be legal tender, Governor Godwin Emefiele said at a briefing in Abuja on Wednesday. That will give citizens of the West African country, where cash dominates transactions, six weeks to exchange their notes.