• Current CPI overstating general price level, report insists
Despite halting the four-year monetary tightening, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) said a single-digit inflation rate remains its medium-term target.

The CBN Governor, Olayemi Cardoso, disclosed this at the CBN Governor’s Annual Lecture Series at the Lagos Business School, Lagos, at the weekend. The insistence stems from an argument by some research organisations that the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) data, which puts the country’s headline inflation at 20.12 percent, overestimates the general price level.

Renaissance Capital Africa (Rencap) reported last week that Nigeria’s inflation might have slowed down to 12 per cent in October – about eight percentage points below the August official rate – and that it could be heading to a single digit next year.

Cardoso said the CBN is on track to bring down the headline inflation to a single digit in the next few years. The Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) at its last meeting reduced the benchmark interest rate by half a per cent, sending a signal that it was satisfied with the disinflationary trend.

Cardoso also scored the CBN’s commitment to transparency as uncommon and reiterated that nobody would need to know anyone in the corridors of power to access FX for business operations by the time he leaves office. He said the international community was impressed by the level of transparency, which has raised the confidence level.

According to him, the CBN has reduced the ways and means (WM) facility beyond the statutory limit since he assumed office. The payment of outstanding FX obligations, he noted, was a game-changer in confidence-building. He could have chosen not to honour the obligations, he told participants, but bowed to pressure as part of his commitment to strengthening the integrity of the apex bank as a “going concern”.

“When I took office, I made a promise. We would clear the verifiable backlog of monies owed by Nigeria to third parties. To be honest, I had no idea how we were going to do it, but it was not negotiable. We needed to protect and maintain our integrity…

“If we are a going concern, and if we expect people to trust and invest in our economy, we must keep our promises. That action contributed in no small way to the rise in our reserves. People invest when they see credibility and transparency,” he said.

The governor said the bank would continue to work with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on a framework to regulate cryptocurrency and blockchain. He recalled how Nigeria once rose to global prominence as a major hub for cryptocurrency trading at a time when regulators were struggling to keep up with rapidly evolving digital currency trading. He admitted that the market’s explosive growth took regulators by surprise, forcing them to reevaluate their approach.

“What began as a fringe trend quickly developed into a complex financial ecosystem, attracting not just young tech-savvy Nigerians but people across all demographics. As digital currency adoption surged, so too did the challenges of protecting users and ensuring market stability,” he said.