…Liquidity ratio more than double CBN benchmark
…. Excess liquidity outpaces lending to businesses
A Nigerian creative entrepreneur spent months knocking on the doors of banks in search of financing to grow her business. One after another, lenders turned her away until she finally found one willing to take a chance on her.
“I refused to take no as an answer, and I fought all the banks until I found the bank that supported me,” she recalled. “I built my business case, I built my personal brand, I built a product they could not ignore, and they were forced to give me money when I needed money.”
Her experience mirrors the reality facing many Nigerian businesses, particularly small and medium-sized enterprises, which continue to struggle to access bank credit despite lenders sitting on their strongest liquidity position, following a successful regulatory-imposed recapitalisation exercise in March.
