CBN Announces Over 200% Surge in eNaira Circulation As Banks, Fintech Plans New Digital Currency

• The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has provided an insight into how Nigerians are using eNaira
• The digital currency unveiled in 2021 is yet to be fully accepted or understood by Nigerians for transaction
• Latest data from CBN gives another level of optimism as cash scarcity continues to bite Nigerians hard

Legit.ng journalist Dave Ibemere has over a decade of experience covering Tech, Energy, Stocks, Investments, and Economy.

The Central Bank of Nigeria has revealed that the volume of eNaira in circulation has increased by 284.6% to N9.78 billion.

The apex disclosed this in its recently published 'economic report' for August 2023.

Details from CBN economic report

The CBN noted that the volume of eNaira in circulation is still insignificant compared to the coins and notes in circulation.

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Part of the report reads:

“There was a substantial increase in the eNaira, which rose by 284.6 % to N9.78 billion although the ratio of eNaira to CIC at 0.37% remained insignificant, compared with notes and coins which accounted for 99.63%.

The volume of notes and coins, however, declined by 14.0 per cent to N2.65tn at end-August 2023.”

Earlier, Legit.ng reported that the IMF revealed that the adoption of eNaira by households and merchants has been slow and low.

The global institution, in a report titled 'Nigeria's eNaira, One Year After," said:

“The retail wallet downloads saw a few weeks of initial surge before tapering off. More specially, it only took 25 days for the number of downloaded wallets to reach 500,000 units—but going from there to 600,000 units took another 63 days; and to 700,000 units yet another 143 days.

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“As of end-November 2021, the total number of retails eNaira wallets amounted to about 860,000. This is just 0.8 per cent of Nigeria’s active bank accounts. Merchant wallet download has reached about 100,000 in end-June, which is about one eleventh of the number of merchants with Point-of-Sales (POS) terminals—which enables credit or debit card payments.”

Nigerian banks fintech companies move to develop new crypto

In an earlier report, Legit.ng revealed that the CBN had developed a guideline for cryptocurrency trading by Nigerian banks.

The development comes as a consortium of Nigerian banks and fintech firms partner to develop a new stablecoin.

The new stablecoin, cNGN, is backed by the Nigerian currency and designed to benefit token holders.

Source: Legit.ng