Let me share experience of what happened today.

A colleague needed just USD500 and we went to Eko hotel, to our total shock, the vendors do not have cash up to that, this is the surprise of the century becuase these are vendors that typically boasts of hundreds of thousands of dollars combined not having just 500USD. it took 4 of them to form a “syndicate” to get just 500 USD.

One of them said and I quote, “we don change more than one billion since they announced that dem go change naira” this is just in two days, just as my colleague was contemplating 778 naira to a USD, someone came and asked the price, the vendor said 778, he said he will pay 800 and has 3 million naira to change to USD. They simply told him oga we no get even if you wan pay 1000 naira (per USD). One of them said he had taken consignment of 100k dollars from Kano through air freight this morning but it didn’t last 30 minutes (something that used to last them a week sometimes.

Banks in VI and Ikoyi today ran out of FX and were pushing customers around branches just so that closing time can come. Someone needed to withdraw just a thousand dollars and moved round like 7 branches of two major old generation banks but still didn’t get.

The FX vendors in eko hotels are of the opinion that if this could happen in just two days, then dollar will reach 1000 naira to a USD before the year ends and may be 1200 before January 31 when the old notes will be phased out, except there is a change of direction.

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