The Central Bank of Nigeria said it is cutting the transaction charges attached to its CBDC, the e-Naira. The bank declared a 50% cut in the charges in anticipation that it would, in turn, boost the number of transactions carried out with the e-Naira. The central bank equally thinks that adopting the CBDC widely will boost the trading volumes accruing to Nigeria.
Encouraging Merchants and Individuals
The Central Bank of Nigeria made the new move so it can help Nigerians embrace the country’s CBDC. The cut in transaction charges by as much as 50% is supposed to encourage merchants and individuals alike to adopt the digital payment system.
Furthermore, businesses in Nigeria that sign up to become merchants of the e-Naira are said to have an opportunity of increasing their individual e-commerce patronage volumes by as much as 50%.
A statement ascribed to the bank’s Deputy Governor, Kingsley Obiora, by a local news outlet said cash management can be further improved when Nigerian businesses adopt the CBDC. And it has the potential of boosting the country’s trade volumes with neighboring countries.
Onboarding the Unbanked
Obiora stated further that the third phase of the cross-border payment implementation of the digital currency project is projected to boost the cross-border trading sector by close to 30%. Also, reducing the transaction charges has the goal of increasing the usage of the e-Naira by both volumes of transactions and its financial value. It is equally expected to increase the generation of revenue for businesses.
Obiora’s comments came up at an event to onboard merchants recently. It was a few days after the Governor of the central bank, Godwin Emefiele, disclosed to the press that the new CBDC currently has less than one million users altogether.
Nevertheless, news outlets are quoting statements from the bank that it is currently working towards having users of the digital currency increase over ten times. The bank’s Governor, Emefiele, announced that a means of achieving this is that the bank would roll out a feature that enables those without smartphones or bank accounts to use the CBDC freely.
The Central Bank of Nigeria launched a USSD code that it said would help facilitate financial inclusion.