CBN to redesign three Naira notes before December

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) on Wednesday said it will redesign the N200, N500, and N1,000 notes.

CBN Governor, Godwin Emefiele, disclosed this during a special press briefing in Abuja.

He explained that the new design and issues will be effective from December 15, 2022.

While advising Nigerians to take old notes to banks for the new notes, Emefiele said that the action was taken in order to take control of the currency in circulation.

According to him, the bulk of the nation’s currency notes was outside bank vaults and the CBN would not allow the situation to continue.

“To be more specific, as at the end of September 2022, available data at the CBN indicates that N2.7 trillion out of the N3.3 trillion currency in circulation was outside the vault of commercial banks across the country and supposedly held by members of the public,” he said.

“Evidently, currency in circulation has more than doubled since 2015, rising from N1.46 trillion in December 2015 to N3.2 trillion as at September 2022. I must say that this is a worrisome trend that must not be continued to be allowed.”