The 299th Monetary Policy Committee meeting, which was originally set for February 17 and 18, 2025, has been rescheduled by the Central Bank of Nigeria.
The meeting will now take place on February 18 and 19, 2025, the apex bank announced in a statement on Monday.
The 299th meeting of the Central Bank of Nigeria’s Monetary Policy Committee, which was originally planned for February 17 and 18, 2025, will now take place on Wednesday, February 18, and Thursday, February 19, 2025, according to the release.
The announcement puts a stop to conjecture on the dates of the meetings, which started when the National Bureau of Statistics took a long time to provide the updated Consumer Price Index.
Economic specialists are closely monitoring whether the committee would maintain or raise the Monetary Policy Rate in response to current economic conditions, the statement said, adding that a new date has been confirmed.
Originally scheduled for January 27–28, the first MPC meeting for 2025 was rescheduled for February, ostensibly to give time for the release of the revised GDP and inflation data.
This would not be the first time the CBN postponed its MPC meeting under the leadership of Olayemi Cardoso.
As investors and experts await Cardoso’s action to combat rising inflation, the CBN postponed another meeting of its MPC after he was recently appointed in September 2023.
On February 26 and 27, the CBN hosted its first MPC meeting of 2024, the first one presided over by Cardoso. Inflation trends play a major role in monetary policy decisions, but the NBS has not yet released the rebased CPI, which was anticipated by the end of January.
This raises questions regarding the timeliness of important economic indicators before the MPC meeting. The 15th of each month is usually when the NBS issues its CPI data. Should the organization continue this custom, the inflation report might be released three days prior to the newly scheduled MPC meeting.