Stubborn inflation, fragile economic growth may force MPC to retain all rates
Whereas the nation waits till later today, September 26, 2017 for the communiqué at the end of the two-day Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), economists have reached consensus that the best option for the stubborn inflation and fragile recovery from recession is to retain all rates as they are since the last review.
Observers also see the Friday’s decision by OPEC to retain oil cut exemption for Nigeria as a window for the current strength of the naira to firm further on the retaining of all rates.
Even though local currency is expected to trade little change against the United States dollar this week as investors await the Central Bank of Nigeria’s (CBN) MPC decision on interest rate on Tuesday, caution is expected to avoid shocks.
All leading market research companies including FDSH and other had a consensus that the best thing to happen to the economy will be the retaining of monetary policy rate at 14 per cent.
The CBN Governor, Mr. Godwin Emefiele, said the committee would announce its policy decisions on September 26.
Aside the positive indicators that show that economy may be on recovery trend, research bodies monitoring the economic indices say the policymakers may be forced to leave all the key monetary policy instruments unchanged to limit heavy shocks on portfolio inflows and currency market liquidity.
Several experts who spoke to our correspondents on possible decisions that may taken tomorrow say not much is expected in terms of calibrating the rates so as not to hobble expected new investments and existing ones.
