The Central Bank of Nigeria has revealed that its foreign exchange reserves gained estimated $968 million when it rose to $31.8 billion on August 29, 2017.

The foreign exchange reserves started the year at $25.8 billion, up 23.1% from the previous year, still far off a peak of $64 billion hit in August 2008.

In the last 8 months, the foreign exchange buffer of CBN has risen by estimated $5.97 billion from $25.8 billion it opened this year in spite of the apex bank's unrelenting intervention in the foreign exchange market.

The foreign reserves rose by $4.45 billion in Q1 of 2017 amid CBN sustained pressure in bridging the gap between official foreign exchange & parallel market rates with the introduction of several foreign exchange windows.

Statistics on the CBN website showed that the foreign exchange reserves rose by 17.2% to $30.29 billion on March 30, 2016 from $25.84 billion it opened this year.

Particularly, the foreign reserves for the first time in 2017 hit $30 billion on March 8, & hovering around $29 billion & $28 billion in February.