CBN Report: High bank charges, others constrain businesses in December

A recent survey by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has revealed that businesses in the country faced significant challenges in December 2024.

According to the report, high bank charges, poor infrastructure, an unfavorable economic climate, insecurity, and difficulties in accessing credit were the biggest obstacles for businesses during the period.

Despite these hurdles, the report, titled “Business Expectation Survey (BES),” showed that firms remained optimistic about Nigeria’s overall macroeconomic conditions.

It stated: “Respondents mentioned high bank charges, poor infrastructure, unfavorable economic climate, insecurity and access to credit as top business constraints for December 2024.

“Respondent firms were optimistic about the overall macroeconomy. The optimism may be attributed to the positive outlook on Exchange rate, volume of business activities, and volume of total order.

“The overall confidence index (CI) on the macroeconomy indicated that businesses were optimistic in December 2024.

“The optimism on business outlook in the current month is driven by the opinion of respondents from all the sectors.

“Respondents expressed optimism on volume of business activity for the next month and subsequent periods under review.

“Respondents firm expects the naira to appreciate in the review months. “In line with the favourable expectations businesses hope to employ more workers in the month of January 2025.

“An analysis of sectors showed that agriculture had the highest prospect for expansion in January.”

Meanwhile, the CBN in its ‘Inflation Expectation Survey Report’ also released yesterday, said small businesses at 83.9 percent had the highest perception of high inflation rate in December 2024.

It added: “Further analysis by income distribution indicates that more households earning between N150,001-N200,000 per month perceive inflation to be high. “Respondents (Businesses & households) believe that energy cost, exchange rate, transportation cost, and insecurity influenced their perception on the inflation rate in the month under review.

“Businesses and Household respondents expect the level of inflation to gradually ease.”