Nigeria Still In JP Morgan Bond Index, Says Emefiele

Godwin Emefiele, the Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), has reacted to the media reports that JP Morgan delisted Nigeria from its bond index.

According to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), the apex bank governor said this after presenting and analysing the Monetary Policy Committee’s communique on Tuesday in Abuja.

According to him, Nigeria is still in the index.

“Let me say that contrary to widespread media reports that we were delisted or that we were removed from the JP Morgan bond index; and the truth is that, that is very untrue. Nigeria is still in their index.

“We were only reclassified. Nigeria’s rating, I will say was reclassified from overweight to market weight, which is just a mere reclassification of our size in the index.

“So, let me say and I repeat, Nigeria has not been delisted from any JP Morgan bond index.

"We have the report here, page 10 of it; I won’t bore you with it.

"You can go online and read it. Page 10 was specifically devoted to Nigeria.

"And it was very, very clear the reason why Nigeria’s rating was moved from overweight to just market weight."

The use of JP Morgan’s Emerging Markets Bond Overweight and Underweight is to make recommendations on stocks to buy or avoid.

When a stock has an overweight recommendation, it is projected to outperform its sector in the near future.

According to the US-based bank, Nigeria had failed to utilise the global rise in crude oil prices to boost foreign reserves