Macroeconomic Report & Economic Updates
May 30, 2017
Africa Economic Update (Issue 3)
Available data shows that headline inflation rates increased and remained high in most countries in the region in February 2017. Specifically, inflation rate increased in Egypt (30.2), Burundi (20.9 percent), Kenya (10.28), and Ethiopia (8.5 percent), while it eased in Nigeria (17.78 percent), Ghana (13.2 percent), South Africa (6.3 percent), and Namibia (7.8 percent). Seychelles (-0.6 percent) remained in deflation while Sudan (32.86 percent) and Tunisia (4.6 percent) had unchanged inflation rates within the review period. Increased cost of food continued to plague the region as food component of inflation remained the major driver of inflation. Drought in East Africa continues to compound price pressure in the region. Inflation rates in Burundi6, Kenya and Ethiopia increased by 8, 3.29, and 2.4 percentage points respectively, signifying the three highest price increase in the review period
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Capital Importation And Gross Domestic Product Growth Rate And Contribution To GDP (Construction Sector)
Capital Importation: Capital expenditure into the construction sector remained above 10 percent since 2005 until 2015. Similar to the manufacturing sector, overall capital imported into the constructi
Nigeria Economic Update (Issue 8)
The falling tide in the international value
of Naira experienced a reversal in the review week with naira appreciating
significantly by 11 percent from N516/$ on February 17, 2017 to N460/$ on
February 24, 2017 at the parallel market the first appreciation
since December 2016. The recent rise in naira value was driven by forex
supply-demand gap closure, sequel to improvements in dollar liquidity. The
recent CBN Special intervention (e.g. the auction and sale of $370 million and
$1.5 million respectively, by the apex bank during the week) and its
revised forex policy guidelinescontributed in dousing speculations
in the parallel market, thus gradually narrowing the margin between the
interbank and parallel market rates. Given that the sustainability of naira
appreciation is strongly hinged on the improvement in foreign reserve which is
largely dependent on crude oil sales, the government should continue its
efforts at calming tensions in the Niger Delta region.
Nigeria Economic Update (Issue 20)
The Naira maintained slight appreciation against the dollar in the review week. At the parallel market, the value of the Naira appreciated week-on-week by 1.6 percent to exchange at N380/$ on May 19, 2017. In addition, inter-bank market rate appreciated slightly by 15kobo to N305.45/$. The appreciation in both segments of the market are favorable effects of the CBNs continued forex supply in the week under review (In a bid to further ease forex liquidity, the CBN pumped a total of $457.3 million on May 15, 2017).