E-Financial
Nigeria Records 67% Rise In Electronic Money Transactions During COVID-19 Lockdown – CBN
Mr Godwin Emefiele, Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, has revealed that electronic transaction volumes increased by about 67 per cent during the COVID-19 lockdown with increased transactions at agent networks.
This is contained in a statement issued by Mr Nelson Olagundoye, Head, Corporate Communication and External Relation, Chartered Institute of Bankers of Nigeria (CIBN) in Lagos on Thursday.
Olagundoye quoted Emefiele as saying this during the 20th edition of the National Seminar on Banking and Allied Matters for Judges.
The seminar was organised by the CIBN, in collaboration with the National Judicial Institute (NJI), under the auspices of the Bankers Committee of CBN.
Emefiele was represented by the Deputy Governor of CBN, Aisha Ahmad, at the seminar.
The CBN governor said that the payment system infrastructure accommodated the surge as more citizens moved to electronic channels.
He said that the banking and payments system was able to retain its operational resilience, maintaining availability of electronic payment and mobile banking channels.
Emefiele, who highlighted the role of technology, noted that this was in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic, which has ‘’unraveled itself as a global health and economic crisis of seismic proportions’’.
He said that domestic and international travel and global trade value chains had suffered severe disruptions, with significant negative impact on financial markets, financial services industry, oil and gas health, transport & aviation, education, hospitality and tourism, to mention just a few.
“Individuals, families, businesses, industries, economies, countries – all have had to adapt to a new normal, even as global coronavirus cases continue to rise above 50 million.
“The effects of the pandemic, particularly the crash in international of prices, disruption in trade value chains and muted business activities during the lockdowns have severely impacted economic output and heightened domestic macroeconomic vulnerabilities with GDP growth for Q2 2020 contracting by 6.10 per cent compared to 1.87per cent growth in Q1, 2020, a decline of -7.9per cent,” he said.
Emefiele, however, noted that the Nigerian financial services sector continues to be resilient, with positive financial soundness indicators evidenced by strong capital adequacy, liquidity and asset quality metrics.
He said that banks and other financial institutions sustained the credit growth momentum, channeling significant amount of lending (over N3.7 trillion) to the real sector– manufacturing, consumer, agriculture, etc.
Emefiele advised that the administration of Justice process should also leverage technology to facilitate mass communication and business processes in the country.
He said that to stimulate fast trial and opportunities in the new normal, the judiciary needed to undertake critical steps such as keying into digital transformation to improve the efficiency of the justice delivery system.
“Electronic trials should be used to complement traditional court hearings to clear backlog and improve the speed of dispensation of justice.
“The judicial system must keep abreast of the transformations to be in a pole position to adjudicate cases presented by the financial sector.
“The sector should ramp up investments in critical infrastructure (hardware and software) needed to function in the new normal.
“Above all, continuous learning and capacity development in ICT skills is critical for the judiciary to maintain its support for the financial services industry in its intermediation role,” he said.
The statement also quoted Mr Bayo Olugbemi, President/Chairman of CIBN, as saying that the banking industry had embraced the innovations accompanying what is now known as the “New Normal”.
” With the option of working from home now more of a reality than ever, banks and other financial institutions have further leveraged on technological advancements to improve the efficiency of services, operations, compliance and regulations,” he said.
Federal government has mandated banks and financial institutions to begin reporting monthly transactions exceeding N25 million for individuals and N100 million for firms to the tax authorities.
Under the new provisions of the Nigerian Tax Act, financial institutions are required to submit quarterly returns to the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS).
The agency will be renamed to the Nigeria Revenue Service (NRS) from January 2026, when the new tax system will take effect.
“Every person who has an obligation to deduct and remit tax under this Act or any other Returns for tax legislation shall render monthly returns to the appropriate tax authority, as specified deduction of tax in the regulation issued for that purpose,” the Act reads.
“Without prejudice to section 142 of this Act, every bank, insurance company, stock-broking firm, or any other financial institution, shall prepare, with or without demand be delivered by the relevant tax authority, quarterly returns to the relevant tax authority specifying the names and addresses of new customers;Nigerian fashion trends
“…and existing customers in the case of (i) an individual, all transactions where the cumulative transactions in a month amount to N25,000,000 or more, or (ii) a body corporate, all transactions where the cumulative transactions in a month amount to N100,000,000 or more.”
Prior to the new tax law, banks were mandated to report deposits of N5 million — a measure intended to curb illicit financial flows, according to TheCable
Experts said the shift is part of efforts to tighten anti-money laundering reporting in the financial sector.
In 2023, Nigeria was listed on the grey list by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) over deficiencies in tackling money laundering and terrorism financing.
Since then, the country has been making efforts to exit the grey list, which subjects it to increased monitoring by the FATF.
In November 2024, Hafsat Bakari, chief executive officer (CEO) of the Nigerian Financial Intelligence Unit (NFIU), said Nigeria has achieved upgrades in five key recommendations from the FATF.
Nigeria Inter-Bank Settlement System (NIBS) has revealed that the number of active bank accounts in the country increased to 320 million in the first quarter of 2025.
NIBSS also announced that the country’s cashless transactions rose to N295 trillion in the that quarter, up from N237.11 trillion in the corresponding quarter of 2024.
NIBSS disclosed this in its latest report on the country’s financial sector.
According to the data, the report highlighted the growing reliance on digital payments nationwide.
Details from the report showed that electronic payment channels were used 2.21 billion times in Q1, while point-of-sale, PoS terminals recorded 776.94 million transactions.
The NIBSS report corroborates ACI Worldwide data, which indicated that the volume of Nigeria’s real-time payment transactions will reach 19.7 billion by 2028, up from 7.9 billion in 2023.
“In Nigeria, real-time payments are quickly becoming a viable alternative to cash, historically the dominant choice for payments in the country,” ACI said.
Mr Wale Edun, minister of Finance and coordinating minister of the Economy, has inaugurated Mr Thompson Oludare Sunday, new managing director/chief executive officer of the Nigeria Deposit Insurance Corporation (NDIC), and Dr Kabir Sabo Katata, executive director (Operations), at the Ministry of Finance, Abuja.
Mr Wale Edun, minister of Finance and coordinating minister of the Economy, flanked by Mr Thompson Oludare Sunday, new managing director/chief executive officer of the Nigeria Deposit Insurance Corporation (NDIC), and Dr Kabir Sabo Katata, executive director (Operations),
In his speech during the occasion, the Minister submitted that the NDIC, as a component of the financial safety-net has a crucial role to play in the nation’s march to economic stability and prosperity.
He therefore charged the Management team to bring their diverse wealth of experience to bear on their new assignment while assuring them of the ministry’s full support in the task ahead.
Responding, Mr Sunday who spoke on behalf of the Management team, expressed appreciation to His Excellency, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu for their appointment.
He assured the Hon Minister of the readiness of the Management under his leadership to live up to expectations of the President in particular and the nation in general in the discharge of their duties.
The Management later received by the Corporation’s Head Office with a warm welcome by the workforce.
A statement signed by Hawwau Gambo, head, Communication & Public Affairs Department, revealed that Addressing the workers on behalf the Management team, Mr. Sunday promised to work in harmony with the staff to move the Corporation to its next level performance.
He stressed that the Management’s focus would be based on the public policy objectives, functions and mandate devolved on the Corporation by the enabling law that established it.
Thompson Oludare Sunday is a seasoned financial expert with over 30 years of regulatory and supervisory experience.
Having cut his teeth with the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) in 1989, he went ahead to acquire high-end knowledge in Central Banking, spending 24 unbroken years in banking supervision.
While his vast experience is in the regulation and supervision of licensed institutions, his deep expertise span corporate governance, risk management and compliance as veritable tool for ensuring the safety and soundness of institutions.
He is a highly analytical and cross functional team worker with strong interest in building individual and institutional capacity for transformation and excellence.
Thompson’s skills and experience were horned by several key responsibilities and special assignments he handled for the apex Bank before his retirement as a Director 2021.
Kabir Sabo Katata, ED (Operations), is a quantitative energy strategist and computational finance expert with strong power trading and risk management experience.
He has over twenty-eight years’ experience in the design and management of technically innovative systems in multiple industries including telecommunications, IT, energy (petroleum & power), finance and government.
He is a specialist in sophisticated financial optimization, the application of modern statistical techniques and mathematics to energy, deposit insurance and banking sectors.
Dr. Katata joined the service of the Nigeria Deposit Insurance Corporation in 2012 as an Assistant Director in the Research, Policy and International Relations Department and rose to the pinnacle of his career as Director in January 2022, before his new appointment as Executive Director (Operations).
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