Lagos, Feb. 3, 2025 – Aminu Gwadabe, the President of the Association of Bureau De Change Operators of Nigeria (ABCON), has urged the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to reduce the capital requirements for BDCs.
Gwadabe made the call in a statement on Sunday.
He said the down ward review of the new prescribed minimum capital base had remained a challenge for majority of the operators.
The CBN, had on February 23, 2024, raised the prescribed minimum capital requirement for BDCs to between N2 billion and N500 million from N35 million.
According to the CBN guidelines, BDCs with Tier 1 licences must have N2 billion capital base, while those with Tier 2 licences must have N500 million.
The association also urged the CBN to grant the group self-regulatory status.
Gwadabe said the status would enable ABCON to sanction non-compliant operators.
He said the self-regulatory status would also aid the forward guidance of its members and boost compliance with regulatory guidelines.
The ABCON boss also urged the CBN to adopt the operators’ IT platforms to entrench a tech-driven industry and boost transparency in market operations.
He commended the apex bank over the recent appreciation of the naira against the dollar and other global currencies.
Gwadabe said the development confirmed that the policies of the CBN and foreign exchange market reforms were yielding positive results.
He listed some factors that led to the appreciation of the naira as the newly implemented foreign exchange (FX) code, investor confidence, investment in oil and gas output, streamlining diaspora remittances aimed at enhancing market liquidity, transparency and guiding market participants in Nigeria’s foreign exchange sector.
Gwadabe said the naira would further appreciate if the CBN could meet all the demands of BDCs.
He advised all BDC operators to ensure full compliance with the FX Code guidelines in their operations, while also adopting regulatory, management, Board, and activity report for their Risk exposures on their AML/CFT manual.
The ABCON leader expressed support to the directive of the CBN that all institutions engaged in the foreign exchange market must also provide a detailed implementation plan outlining how they intend to achieve full compliance with the FX Code to the apex bank. (GBN)
