Nigeria’s foreign exchange utilisation rose to $18.34 billion in the second quarter of 2026, its highest quarterly level since Q3 2011, driven by services and financial payments rather than merchandise imports.
This is according to the Financial Markets Dealers Association (FMDA) Q2 2026 FX Market Update, which draws on data from the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).
Total FX utilisation increased 12.84% from approximately $16.25 billion in Q1 2026 and 52.42% from $12.03 billion in the corresponding quarter of 2025.
Financial Services Dominate FX Demand:
Invisible-related transactions, covering services and financial payments, accounted for the largest share of FX utilisation during the quarter. Demand in this category reached a record $13.24 billion, representing 72.19% of the total and an increase of 93.16% from $6.85 billion a year earlier.
Merchandise imports accounted for $5.10 billion, down 1.49% year on year, highlighting the growing contribution of financial and services transactions to overall FX demand.
- Financial services utilised $9.64 billion, or 52.58% of total FX demand, up 72.81% from $5.58 billion in Q2 2025.
- Business services demand increased 191.39% to $1.66 billion, while other services rose 118.66% to $1.12 billion.
- Industrial imports declined 22.67% to $1.86 billion, while oil imports fell 9.75% to $1.25 billion.
- Manufactured products demand increased 77.73% to $982.09 million, while food-related utilisation rose 26.20% to $649.99 million.
- Financial services alone accounted for almost 1.9 times the foreign exchange utilised for all merchandise imports combined.
FMDA linked the strength in financial-services demand to cross-border investment and payment flows, although the report did not provide a detailed breakdown of the $9.64 billion.
The figure should therefore not be interpreted solely as confirmed investment repatriation or capital flight, while the report also identified $542.56 million in unallocated invisible demand because the June figures did not fully reconcile.
Autonomous inflows dominate FX supply:
Nigeria’s foreign exchange inflows became more reliant on autonomous sources during the second quarter, while CBN dollar sales declined sharply. Autonomous inflows increased to $23.31 billion, their highest level since Q1 2020, and accounted for 74.15% of total inflows.
- This represented the highest autonomous inflow share in 13 years, compared with approximately 64% of total inflows recorded throughout 2025.
- CBN FX sales fell 66.73% to $418.08 million from $1.26 billion in Q1 2026.
- First-half CBN dollar sales totalled $1.67 billion, the lowest for any half-year period since FMDA’s records began in 2008.
- Total FX inflows declined 2.96% to $31.43 billion, while CBN-sourced inflows fell 20.44% to $8.12 billion.
- Total FX outflows decreased 19.22% to $8.93 billion, lifting net FX flows to $22.50 billion, their highest level since Q4 2019.
- First-half net FX flows reached $43.84 billion, representing a 47.24% increase from the corresponding period of 2025.
- The figures indicate that autonomous sources supplied nearly three-quarters of total inflows during the quarter, even as overall inflows declined from Q1.
However, net FX flows represent the difference between reported inflows and outflows and should not be interpreted as an equivalent increase in Nigeria’s external reserves.
Financial payments reshape FX demand:
The latest figures extend a pattern already evident in Nigeria’s foreign exchange market during 2025, when services and financial transactions accounted for a larger share of utilisation than merchandise imports.
- Nairametrics previously reported that total FX utilisation increased 91.1% to $50.93 billion in 2025, its highest annual level since 2019.
- Invisible transactions accounted for $30.99 billion of FX utilisation in 2025, compared with $19.94 billion allocated to imports.
- Total FX inflows reached $109.9 billion in 2025, according to figures previously reported by Nairametrics.
- Autonomous inflows increased 25.12% to $70.54 billion in 2025, representing 64.21% of total inflows.
- The autonomous inflow share subsequently increased to 74.15% in Q2 2026, while financial services accounted for 52.58% of FX utilisation.
FX utilisation measures foreign exchange used by the transaction category, while net flows measure the difference between reported inflows and outflows.