Author: Olu Anisere

FCCPC Raids Utako Market, Seals Shops Over Rebagged, Underweight Rice The Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC), has raided and sealed some shops at Utako market for selling re-bagged and under-weight bags of rice. Sealing the shops in Abuja on Tuesday, Mrs Boladale Adeyinka, the Director, Surveillance and Investigations Department of FCCPC, said the raid followed an intelligence gathered by the Commission. She said the intelligence showed that traders in the market were re-bagging local rice in foreign rice bags and selling them at exorbitant prices as imported rice. Adeyinka described the move as exploitative, and against consumer economic…

$17bn: Nigeria Positions as World Bank’s Largest Portfolio in Africa Nigeria has been named as the World Bank’s largest portfolio in Africa, with commitments totaling around $17 billion, Ousmane Diagana, vice president for Western and Central Africa, who led a high-level delegation from the World Bank to Abuja, said. Diagana met today with the Honourable Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Wale Edun, to reaffirm support for President Bola Tinubu’s economic reform agenda and development priorities.  Diagana praised Nigeria’s recent GDP growth of 3.4%—the strongest since 2014 — and commended the government’s progress in stabilising the economy…

Yield on Nigerian Treasury Bills Crosses 21% Ahead of Auction The average yield on Nigerian Treasury bills crossed 21% as investors continue to reduce the naira holdings in the secondary market. Trading activity was active ahead of a potential treasury bills auction. The market saw offers prevail at the long end (+18bps) and mid segment (+17bps) of the curve, causing the average yield to increase by 8 basis points (bps) to reach 21.13%, investment firm CardinalStone Limited told investors in an emailed note. The secondary market for Treasury instruments commenced the week with mixed sentiment—with foreign portfolio investors rotating out…

Trump Moots Attack on Iran’s Nuclear Facilities as Talks Continue U.S. President Donald Trump has reiterated his threat of drastic consequences for Iran over its nuclear programme, including a potential attack on Tehran’s nuclear facilities. During a meeting at the White House with Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele, Trump said, “They can’t have a nuclear weapon, and they’ve got to go fast, because they’re fairly close to having one, and they’re not going to have one. “And if we have to do something very harsh, we’ll do it. And I’m not doing it for us. “I’m doing it for the world,…

Bitcoin Climbs to $85K in Fresh Cryptos Market Rally Bitcoin and other major digital assets were broadly firmer late Monday due to a fresh rally in the cryptocurrency markets. Pushing the global market cap of all cryptocurrency near $2.7 trillion, trading data showed that Bitcoin (BTC/USD) was standing above the $85,000 level. The CoinDesk Market Index, which tracks dozens of digital assets including Bitcoin, increased 0.2% in the past 24 hours. The Nasdaq 100 rose 0.6%, the S&P 500 added 0.8%, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average increased 0.8%. Bitcoin rose 1.4% to $84,936, according to CoinMarketCap data. The most…

Oil Prices Increase as China’s Imports Rebound Oil prices increased in the global commodity market on Monday as traders weighed mixed signals about U.S. tariff implementations while data showed that China’s oil imports rebounded. The market expects demand in China to reduce impacts of higher OPEC+ supply in May. China’s crude oil imports in March rebounded sharply from the previous two months and were up nearly 5% from a year earlier, data showed on Monday, boosted by a surge in Iranian oil and a rebound in Russian oil deliveries. Total imports reached 51.41 million metric tons in March, according to…

Nigerian Treasury Bills Closed at 21% Ahead of Inflation Ahead of March inflation data, the average yield on Nigerian Treasury bills fell to 21% due to bullish momentum seen in the secondary market due to under-allotment at the main auction last week. The market ended trading activities on a bullish note in the just concluded week. Traders reported that local investors picked up papers offloaded by foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) that rotated out from holding naira assets due to a shift in global investment sentiment. There was heightened demand for Treasury papers after the monetary authority under-allotted bills offered at…

Pension Fund Assets Grows to N23.366 Trillion Nigeria’s total pension fund assets climbed to N23.266 trillion, according to the latest data released by the National Pension Commission (PenCom). Details showed that Pension Fund Administrators (PFA) placed more than 62% of total pension assets in Federal Government of Nigeria debt securities as of February close. The Pension Commission reported that pension assets climbed to N23.266 trillion in February, which represents an increase of more than N405 billion over N22.861 trillion reported in January. Further details revealed that total investment in FGN debt instruments gulped N14.468 trillion—with bonds accounting for 85% of…

With less than zero shareholders fund, telecommunication company MTN Nigeria Plc has been projected to return to profitability

First Holdco Closed at N1.046trn with Additional Shares Listing Nigeria’s oldest listed financial services company, First Holdco Plc, closed at a market value of N1.046 trillion on Friday amidst negative share price fluctuation and missed regulatory filing on the Nigerian Exchange. First Holdco Plc.’s share price dropped after the group told the Nigerian Exchange that the audited financial statement for 2024 is awaiting approval from the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN). The group trading data in the equities market showed that the share price dropped to N25 on Friday when 7.572 million units valued at N189.537 million exchanged hands. Week…