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It’s official: Ghanaian Cedi designated world’s worst-performing currency in 2022

Published

2 years ago

October 18, 2022

The Ghanaian Cedi has been officially designated as the world’s worst-performing in 2022 as investors continued to squeeze foreign capital into the West African country, according to report by Bloomberg on Tuesday.

According to the international business media platform, the Cedi took a further slump on Monday and depreciated as much as 3.3%, before paring the loss to 11.2750 to the dollar in the capital, Accra, taking its losses this year to more than 45%, the most among 148 currencies tracked by Bloomberg.

The decline of the Cedi has accelerated since the beginning of the year. Ghana has, for the past two months, been in formal negotiations with the International Monetary Fund for an extended credit facility with the hope of receiving $3bn in loans over three years, the media platform said.

“Ghana’s gross international reserves has been on a steady decline, slumping to $6.6bn in end-September, enough to cover only just under three months of imports. That was down from $10.7bn a year earlier, which gave nearly five months of import cover.

“The currency has overtaken the losses of the Sri Lankan rupee, which has slid nearly 45% against the greenback this year as the country also seeks to unlock an IMF loan following a debt default,” the Bloomberg report said.

The West African country had earlier in the year, sought help from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) after losing access to the Eurobond market, as homegrown policies, including cutting 2022 discretionary expenditure by up to 30%, failed to stem a selloff in its international bonds.

However, the IMF has been slow to yield to Ghana’s request as they require a debt sustainability plan, before lending the country its requested billion bailouts, something the government has failed to guarantee.

Related Topics:Business Cedi Currency Economy Featured Ghana

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Food prices drive second straight monthly hike in Nigeria’s inflation

Published

8 hours ago

November 17, 2024

Ifeoluwa Dada

According to official statistics released on Friday, Nigeria’s inflation rate increased for the second consecutive month in October, rising to 33.88% in annual terms from 32.70% in September, mostly as a result of increasing food costs.

In an attempt to boost economic development and strengthen public finances, President Bola Tinubu devalued the naira and reduced subsidies, which caused inflation to spike in the second half of last year.

As the effects of the naira devaluation started to lessen in July of this year, a slew of hikes in the price of petroleum and devastating floods that destroyed crops once again exacerbated pricing pressures, making the greatest cost-of-living crisis in decades worse in Africa’s most populous country.

According to the National Bureau of Statistics, price increases for basics such as rice, maize, bread, potatoes, and cooking oil prompted food inflation to surge from 37.77% in October to 39.16% year over year.

This year, more than 1.5 million hectares of agriculture have been damaged by torrential rain and floods in 29 of Nigeria’s 36 states, leaving millions hungry and displacing large numbers of people.

In an effort to curb inflation, the central bank has raised interest rates five times this year. On November 26, it is expected to make its final rate decision of the year.

VenturesNow

MTN financial report reveals drop in group service revenue

Published

8 hours ago

November 17, 2024

Ifeoluwa Dada

Due to operational difficulties in Sudan and the depreciation of the Nigerian naira, MTN Group, Africa’s largest telecom provider, announced on Thursday an 18.5% decline in service revenue for the third quarter that concluded on September 30.

With 288 million users in 17 African regions, MTN said that its group service revenue dropped from 156.3 billion rand ($6.99 billion) in the same quarter of the previous year to 127.4 billion rand.

Despite stating that “the naira was less volatile on a sequential basis in Q3 than in preceding quarters,” the business reported a 48.7% decline in MTN Nigeria’s income due to the currency’s depreciation.

Due to a stronger Ugandan shilling than the previous year, Uganda’s largest contributor, MTN South Africa (MTN SA), expanded by a meagre 3.3%.

Due to “subscriber registration regulations in Nigeria and a decline in users in Sudan, where the conflict has displaced millions of people,” the business reported that its subscriber base increased by 1.6% to 288 million.

Given the higher demand in Nigeria despite the legal obstacles, MTN plans to increase its capital expenditures, which it expects would total between 28 and 33 billion rand for the entire year.