Central Bank of Nigeria has made it compulsory for Bureau de Change, BDCs, and other eligible forex dealers to sell dollars to only customers with Bank Verification Numbers, BVN.
The apex bank disclosed this on Tuesday through a document titled, ‘Budgetary, Credit, Foreign Trade and Exchange Policy Guidelines for Fiscal Years 2024/2025’,
The Central Bank also subjected the sale of foreign exchange by BDCs to a maximum of $5,000.
“All customers desiring to purchase foreign exchange in Nigeria must provide their BVN which must be validated by a CBN Authorised Foreign Exchange dealer through the NIBSS platform before the transactions are consummated”, CBN said.
The apex bank threatened to withdraw licenses of BDCs and dealers that fail to meet the requirements.
CBN said, “Any BDC that fails to provide the required information in its returns or provides an inaccurate BVN shall be penalised, and this shall include withdrawal of its authorised dealership licence.
“BDCs shall continue to observe a maximum foreign exchange cash sales limit of US$5,000.00 (Five Thousand US Dollars Only) per approved transaction, or as may be approved by CBN from time to time”.
The central bank permitted BDCs to continue to source their foreign exchange from members of the public and any other source as may be prescribed by the CBN.
“The CBN shall continue to monitor the activities of the BDCs to ensure that no operator is in violation of the anti-money laundering laws”, it added.
