Nigerian banks make a mint from a crisis
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BANKING

Nigerian banks make a mint from a crisis

Oil prices and currency controls created opportunities for some banks, which reported bumper gains from FX and fixed income last year, but no one is expecting a repeat of that. Can lending keep them sweet?

By Rachel Savage

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Nigeria’s economy is hooked on the oil that oozes from beneath the soil and creeks of its southern Delta region.

The oil and gas sector accounts for more than 90% of exports and, until 2014, contributed around 80% of government revenues. So it was to be expected that west Africa’s most populous nation would struggle when the oil price fell from above $110 a barrel in 2014 to as low as $29 at the start of 2016.

The crisis was made worse by the Central Bank of Nigeria’s (CBN) currency controls; in early 2017, these resulted in naira being traded on the black market for dollars at a rate that was 70% weaker than the official one.

The economy shrank for five consecutive quarters from the beginning of 2016, marking Nigeria’s first recession in 25 years. And the recovery – with growth of less than 1% in 2017 – has been almost as painful.

It was expected too that any fall in oil prices would hit Nigeria’s banks. After all, 45% of their lending is to the oil and gas sector, according to an IMF report released in March.





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