Unless banks become more creative and imaginative, they will have little funds left to play with after the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has designated most of the lucrative accounts as public sector funds.
The CBN has directed that deposits from Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) joint venture accounts, sovereign investment funds, be treated as public sector funds.
This directive also affects deposits from ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs), and companies’ collection accounts such as: Customs, Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS), and the Pilgrim Welfare Board, as well as all accounts belonging to government universities.
However, the CBN redefinition of public sector funds does not affect deposits from the government institutions such as Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON), Bank of Industry (BoI), Nigerian Export-Import Bank (NEXIM), Federal Mortgage Bank of Nigeria (FMBN), Bank of Agriculture (BoA), and Bank of Infrastructure.
Other institutions to be excluded from the public sector funds include closed pension funds belonging to government institutions, state pension boards, government’s staff associations and co-operative societies.
Tokunbo Martins, director, banking supervision, CBN, in a letter to all banks released yesterday, said: “It would be recalled that in our circular under reference, DMBs were required to report government deposits as additional memorandum items in their Monthly Bank Return/Daily Bank Return (MBR 300/DBR 300) on e-FASS.
“Subsequent to the above, all DMBs are requested to note that, for the purposes of reporting in accordance with the provisions of the above circular, public sector deposits should include all Federal Government MDAs and Companies, State Government MDAs and Companies as well as
Local Government MDAs and their Companies.”
The CBN, under Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, in July took aim at the easy money at the disposal of Nigerian banks, as the apex bank introduced a 50 percent CRR on public sector deposits.