U.S. worried about currency swaps between Africa and China

Date:

Lagos Nigeria, Sept 13 – The United States is concerned that increased currency swap agreements between China and African nations will reduce visibility into financial transactions and will make it harder to prevent money laundering, a senior U.S. sanctions official said on Thursday.

Thank you for reading this post, don't forget to subscribe!

Marshall Billingslea, the U.S. Treasury Department’s assistant secretary for terrorist financing, told a congressional hearing that while there was greater interest in using the yuan, most African countries still found it necessary to ultimately clear trade in U.S. dollars.

He was responding to questions by Republican Representative Chris Smith, who cited a $2.5 billion currency swap agreement between China and Nigeria to facilitate trade between the two countries, and a meeting of African finance leaders in June that sought to discuss using China’s yuan as a reserve currency for the region.

Nigeria is the third African nation to agree a currency swap deal with China.

“You are very much onto something of great concern to us as well,” Billingslea replied, referring to increased currency swap agreements between China and African governments.

“That said, there remains a great desire among most of the countries in Africa to maintain correspondent banking relationships with U.S. banks. At the end of the day they still are finding it necessary to ultimately clear trade in U.S. dollars,” he said.

He said maintaining those correspondent banking ties was “our best line of defense to ensure we maintain not just a degree of transparency and visibility into the transactions in Africa but … further to ensure that anti-money laundering standards are being applied.”

Reporting by Lesley Wroughton Editing by Leslie Adler

Naija247news
Naija247newshttps://www.naija247news.com/
Naija247news is an investigative news platform that tracks news on Nigerian Economy, Business, Politics, Financial and Africa and Global Economy.

Share post:

Subscribe

Popular

More like this
Related

Naira closes at N1,597.24/$1 in the official market

March 19, 2024. Azonuchechi Chukwu. The official market observed a modest...

Nigerian Bourse declines, All Share Index drops by 0.40%

March 19, 2024. Azonuchechi Chukwu. It was a bearish session on...

Kaduna Governor Advocates for State Police Amidst Banditry Challenges

Kaduna State Governor, Uba Sani, emphasized the urgent need...

EFCC Retrieves 324 Houses for Kano Pensioners in Alleged N4.1 Billion Property Fraud

Yesterday, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) handed...

Discover more from Naija247news

Subscribe now to keep reading and get access to the full archive.

Continue reading