Business
CBN May Tighten Measures, Next Year
Central Bank of Nigeria
(CBN) Governor, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi has said that the banking regulator is likely to tighten than ease policy in the coming year, but it does not currently see a need to move.
Inflation is running at a little over 8 percent currently but should fall back below 8 percent in December, said Sanusi, adding that the bank was keeping an eye on the currency’s exchange rate even if it had been relatively stable of late.
“We are more likely to tighten than ease in the next year,” he said of the central bank’s monetary policy strategy, speaking at an African conference at the Paris headquarters of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.
At its last Monetary Policy Committee meeting in September, the Central Bank held its main rate at 12 percent for the 12th time in a row, citing a stabilising naira and inflation.
The bank has come under pressure in the past to cut rates from businesses who say that would stimulate lending. It has resisted, however, arguing that it is only by staying the course despite such pressure that the economy has stabilised.
Nigeria’s central bank expects inflation to remain in a single-digit band through this year and next. It projects 2014 economic growth at 7.6 percent, which compares with a rate this year of around 6.5 percent.