The loan granted by commercial banks to the private sector declined by 11.93 percent in March 2024, following the liquidity tightening of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).
Data from the CBN showed that credit to the private sector dropped to N71.21 trillion at the end of March 2024 compared to the level of N80.86 trillion in February 2024.
On a quarter-on-quarter basis, banks’ private sector credit also decreased by 6.66 percent from N76.29 trillion in January 2024.
As part of its tightening measures to rein in inflation, the CBN, in one month raised its benchmark interest rate, known as the Monetary Policy Rate (MPR) by 600 basis points to 24.75 percent in March 2024 from 18.75 percent in July 2023.
Nigeria’s inflation rate increased to 33.2 percent for the month of March 2024 according to the latest data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).