According to the Debt Management Office (DMO), the outstanding public debt declined by 5.65 percent from $84 billion to $79.3 billion between December 2019 and March 20201. The reduction was driven by a 9 percent decline in domestic debt from $56.4 billion to $51.6 billion during the same period2. Meanwhile, the change to external debt was minimal as it tapered around $27.6 billion in both periods. While the decline in domestic debt is as a result of the redemption of Nigeria Treasury Bills (NTBs), the stagnation of external debt stems from the government’s need to limit its exposure to exchange rate volatility. However, the $3.4 billion in emergency support received from the IMF in April as well as the reliance on domestic debt to mitigate the impact of the pandemic will increase public debt in the near term. In this context, effective debt management is important not only with regards to the terms of borrowing but also in debt use and transparency.
July 20, 2020
Nigeria Economic Update (Issue 27)
Related
Nigeria Economic Update (Issue 41)
The
naira continued its downward trajectory in the review week. Specifically, naira
depreciated significantly at the parallel segment by 3.5 percent to a record
low of N440/$ on September 23, 2016. Notably, this was driven by
the worsening liquidity constraints at the interbank market which left the
excess forex demand to be sourced at the parallel market, and thus exerted
downward pressure on the naira. The naira is likely to further
weaken given that most of the liquidity constraints are exogenously determined
and thus forex supply will likely remain subdued by its demand.
Extra-ECOWAS Trade And Investment Flows: Any Evidence Of Business Cycles Transmission
This
study investigates the effects of merchandise trade and investment flows on the
transmission of business cycles between members of ECOWAS and the major trading
partnersbetween 1985 and 2014. Total trade and FDI significantly influence the
transmission of business cycles with elasticities of 1.1% and 0.7%,
respectively in the long run. There are little variations across the major
trading partners and other measures of trade flows. Intra-industry trade flows
with all partners, EU and USA influences the cross-country business cycles with
elasticities of 1.0%, 0.5% and 1.8%, respectively.