The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) in 2020/2021 will continue to conduct monetary policy anchored on the Medium-Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF) of the Federal Government, with the objective of achieving price and financial stability. The rationale for the aforementioned is that monetary policy impacts its ultimate goal with a lag.
In consonance with the MTEF, the CBN is able to anchor expectations, deliver time consistent policies and react to temporary shocks including those associated with frequent changes in fiscal policy. The 2020/2021 Monetary, Credit, Foreign Trade and Exchange Policy Guidelines reviews circulars issued from the 2018/2019 edition till end December 2019 to cover the period January 2020 to December 2021.
This document outlines the monetary, credit, foreign trade and exchange policy guidelines applicable to banks and other financial institutions supervised by the CBN in 2020/2021.
On account of new developments in the domestic and global economies in the period, the guidelines may be fine-tuned by the CBN without prior notice. Such amendments shall be communicated to the relevant institutions/stakeholders in supplementary circulars.
This document is organized in Five Sections. Section One is the introduction. In Section Two, developments in the global and domestic economies in 2019 are reviewed to provide a background to the policy measures in 2020/2021.
The monetary and credit measures are enumerated in Section Three. In Section Four, the applicable foreign trade and exchange policy measures are presented. Lastly, Section Five discusses consumer protection issues. The annexures to the guidelines contains prudential guidelines, relevant reporting formats and referenced circulars.
