BDCs meet today, to pressure FX rate operators

Directors of over 3,000 Bureaux De Change operators will today hold a special meeting aimed at taking strategic decisions to force down the exchange rate on the parallel market.

The association, in a statement on yesterday, said the emergency meeting followed last week’s sudden depreciation of the naira against the dollar, pointing out that the development was against the interest of the BDCs and the economy.

The naira closed at 405/dollar on Friday after stabilising at N380/dollar the previous week.

The President, Association of Bureaux De Change Operators of Nigeria, Aminu Gwadabe, said the meeting would be used to warn errant BDC directors about the consequence of violating operating guidelines.

The BDCs, he said, would continue to support the Central Bank of Nigeria’s exchange rate stability objective and ensure that official and parallel market rates’ convergence was achieved.

According to Gwadabe, the theme of the meeting is, ‘Role of the BDCs in price stability – Realities and compliance’

The ABCON president said, “We want the BDC directors to know the gains of price stability, rate harmonisation and regulatory compliance. Operators with infractions will face penalties.

“We did it in 2006 when the BDC window was first opened. We helped the CBN to narrow the huge gap between official and parallel market rates. We are ready to do it again.”

He said the BDCs helped the CBN to narrow the exchange rate gap from N520 to the present rate, and would continue to achieve better results as the CBN continued to fund the BDCs with increased dollar allocations.

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