The maximum deposit insurance coverage levels for Deposit Money Banks has been raised by the Nigeria Deposit Insurance Corporation (NDIC) on Thursday from N500,000 to N5 million.

At a news conference in Abuja, NDIC Managing Director Bello Hassan declared this effective immediately. He said, “For Deposit Money Banks, the increase of the maximum deposit insurance coverage from N500,000 to N5,000,000, would provide full coverage of 98.98% of the total depositors compared with the current cover of 89.20%. Regarding the value of deposits covered, the revised coverage would increase the value of deposits covered by deposit insurance to 25.37% compared with the current cover of 6.31% of the total value of deposits.

“The increase of the maximum deposit insurance coverage from N200,000 to N2,000,000 would provide full coverage of 99.27% of the total depositors compared with the current level of 98.76% and would increase the value of deposits covered by deposit insurance to 34.43% compared with 14.38% of the total value of deposit, currently covered.

“The increase of the maximum deposit insurance coverage from N500,000 to N2,000,000 would provide full coverage of 99.34% of the total depositors compared with the current 97.98% and would increase the value of deposits covered by deposit insurance to 21.04% compared with 10.77% of the total value of the deposit, currently covered.”

Additionally, Hassan said that increasing the maximum deposit insurance coverage for primary mortgage banks from N500,000 to N2,000,000 would cover all depositors, or 99.99% of them, and increase the value of deposits covered by deposit insurance from the current 40.60% cover to 43.10% of the total deposit value.

Additionally, the Corporation increased the maximum pass-through deposit insurance coverage for each Mobile Money Operator subscriber from N500,000 to N5,000,000.

At least two million bank accounts have been closed by different commercial banks in Nigeria following the failure of their owners to update and link them to the National Identity Number (NIN) and the Biometric Verification Number (BVN).

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) had, in December 2023, issued a directive to all commercial banks in the country to restrict Tier-1 accounts without proper BVN, and NIN, that are not linked by March 1st, 2024.

The move by the apex bank, was aimed at eradicating questionable accounts, particularly as some customers failed to comply with regulatory orders on the linkage of their accounts to the NIN, BVN and other requirements.

According to a statement on Wednesday by the Nigerian Interbank Settlement System (NIBSS), the decision to close the accounts was arrived at following the expiration of the CBN deadline.

The NIBSS also indicated that the number of inactive bank accounts grew month-on-month by four million or 2.0 percent to 19.7 million in March 2024 from 19.3 million in the previous month which necessitated a weeding of the process.

The NIBSS, however, indicated that the number of active bank accounts in the country grew by 6.62 million or 3.0 percent to 219.64 million from 213.02 million in February.