Fan of Nigerian one thousand naira banknotes

Market note, 21 May 2026. For current figures see our live rate board.

The naira has been moving within a narrower band in the official market than importers grew used to during the sharper swings of previous years. On 21 May 2026 the CBN’s NFEM rate stood at about 1,372 naira to the dollar, calculated as a volume-weighted average of the day’s trading. For anyone paying foreign suppliers, a steadier rate is genuinely useful. It makes a quotation hold its shape, and it lets you plan a landed cost without the figure moving underneath you between agreeing a price and settling it.

What stability does not mean

It does not mean an old rate is safe to reuse. A narrow band still moves, and import values are large enough that small movements produce real numbers. On a 10,000 dollar supplier payment, the difference between 1,372 and 1,400 is 280,000 naira. That is the clearing budget on a modest consignment, or the inland haulage to the South East, absorbed entirely by a rate you did not check. The error is not usually carelessness. It is that a rate quoted at the start of a conversation gets carried through the whole process, and nobody revisits it before the money leaves.

What to do with a stable market

Use it, rather than relying on it. A calm period is when to settle prices, commit to suppliers and complete payments, because the risk of a move against you between agreement and settlement is lower than usual. It is a window rather than a new normal. And check the rate at four points rather than one: when you first price the product, before you commit to the supplier, before you pay, and when you finalise the landed cost.

One more thing worth knowing

The official rate is a reference, not what you will pay. Your bank’s rate, a BDC rate and the rate at which a supplier is actually settled all differ from it, generally against you. So build your costing on the rate you can actually transact at, and treat the published figure as the starting point for that conversation rather than the answer to it.

Working out what an import will cost you? Tell us what you are planning to bring in and we will work through the product, the shipment and the currency exposure, and tell you what it is likely to land at. There is no charge for it. Request a cost review or get in touch.