Key View

• New President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s inaugural address has led to uncertainty around Nigeria’s reform outlook, increasing inflationary pressures in the short term.
• Despite Tinubu’s reform rhetoric, we retain our view that substantial economic policy shifts are unlikely in the short term.
• Given limited detail provided by the authorities

Key View

• We forecast that real GDP growth in Nigeria will weaken to 2.3% in 2023, from 3.1% in 2022.
• Domestic demand will slow as consumers and businesses face cash and fuel shortages, high inflation and rising interest rates.
• Improving trade dynamics will provide some support to economic growth, as oil production has bottomed out and import

Key View

• At Fitch Solutions, we forecast that the CBN will continue to raise its policy rate to 19.00% by end-2023, after it hiked by 50 basis points (bps) to 18.00% in March.
• Consumer price inflation will remain uncomfortably high over the coming months driven by elevated food prices, incentivising the central bank to tighten monetary policy

Key View

• As we had expected, Bola Ahmed Tinubu – the candidate for the ruling All Progressives Congress – was declared the winner of Nigeria’s presidential election on March 1 2023.
• Despite opposition parties calling for a re-run of the presidential election, we believe that chances of this happening are slim.
• Reduced trust in the electoral

Key View

• Fintech firms and mobile money operators are rushing to capitalise on Nigeria’s current cash crisis, the lack of physical money in circulation proving a significant catalyst to the adoption of digital financial services.
• Whilst a boon for fintech operations, the Central Bank of Nigeria is receiving criticism for its handling of the

Key View

• Economic growth in Nigeria slipped to a six-quarter low of 2.3% in Q422, and we think that growth will ease further in 2023.
• We expect that the country’s economy will expand by just 2.5% due to disruptions associated with the February 2023 election and the continued decline of oil production.
• Growth will accelerate to 3.3% in 2024

Key View

• In light of new data from the NCC, we have created an initial set of forecasts for last-mile fibre adoption in the country.
• Although likely to find an audience in the main business districts, the high cost of fibre means that cheaper alternatives - mainly mobile broadband - will remain dominant.
• A new government-mandated 'Dig Once'

Key View

• At Fitch Solutions, we expect that Nigeria’s current account will flip from a short-lived surplus in 2022 back into deficit in 2023.
• We predict a current account deficit equivalent to 1.1% of GDP in 2023, widening to 1.7% of GDP in 2024.
• Indeed, based on our Oil & Gas team’s pessimistic forecast for Nigerian oil production, we

Key View

• The new Pharmacy Council of Nigeria act will pose an upside risk for drugmakers.
• Reduced illegal trading and counterfeit drugs in the market will increase public confidence.
• Nigeria will remain a highly challenging market for drugmakers over the long term.

Increased scrutiny on the pharmaceutical supply chain in Nigeria will

Key View

• We forecast real household spending in Nigeria to grow by 3.5% y-o-y in 2022, before moderating down to 2.5% y-o-y in 2023.
• We note that Nigeria's rising inflation is a risk to our outlook for consumer spending in 2022 as it will negatively impact consumer purchasing power, largely due to the effects of rising food prices, which