FG to attract foreign savings with new Diaspora Bond, says Minister of Finance

The Federal Government said it has planned to float a Diaspora Bond to attract funds held abroad by Nigerians at home and in the Diaspora. 

The Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy Mr. Wale Edun disclosed this, yesterday, at his wrap up media briefing at the end of the 2024 Spring Meetings of the IMF and World Bank. 

His words, “In terms of remittances, it is certainly one of the ways we can increase supply of foreign exchange and investment in the country. 

“There are Nigerians abroad who are doing very well. Even Nigerians in Nigeria with funds abroad that can be counted as remittance and in order to increase the supply of foreign exchange into the economy, government is looking at attracting those funds through a Diaspora kind of instrument. 

“A Diaspora Bond and we think that will be attractive enough for Nigerians abroad and for foreign holdings of of foreign currencies and look to having a substantial issue later in the year.”

As part of the efforts of the administration to increase foreign exchange inflows, the minister said that that Nigeria has qualified for the processing of a $2.25 billion World Bank facility. 

According to him, “Nigeria has qualified for the processing of a total package of World Bank $2.25 billion of, well there is no free money but it is close to a grant for 40 years, moratorium of 10 years and about 1 percent interest. 

So that is also part of the flow that you can count. “In addition, there is a similar Budgetary Support, low-interest funding from the African Development Bank and clearly , there also on-going discussions with Foreign Direct investors. 

“Some of these things take longer than you expect  but there are relatively advanced discussions on major foreign direct investment inflows into the country,  specific transactions with companies,  institutions and authorities”