Nigeria’s external debt servicing rises to $1.08 billion in Q4 2024

• Nigeria’s external debt servicing rose to $1.08 billion in the fourth quarter of 2024
• Debt service payments were made to multilateral, commercial, and bilateral creditors
• Payments to multilateral lenders accounted for 55.7 per cent of total debt service in Q4 2024

Data by the Debt Management Office (DMO) has disclosed that Nigeria’s external debt service obligations reached $1.08 billion in the fourth quarter (Q4) of 2024.

Recall that Nigeria’s total debt service costs stood at N3.57 trillion in the third quarter (Q3) of 2024, a N60 billion or 1.7 per cent increase from the N3.51 trillion recorded in the second quarter (Q2) of 2024.

The DMO data, which covers the breakdown of external debt service payments by creditor category, further showed that multilateral loans accounted for the largest share of debt service, followed by commercial and bilateral loans.

Breakdown of debt service payment to multilateral, commercial, bilateral creditors

According to the data, Nigeria paid $600.71 million in total to multilateral lenders, which represents 55.7 per cent of total debt service in the fourth quarter of 2024.

The multilateral creditor category was led by the International Monetary Fund (IMF), as it received $407.97 million, the highest payment to any creditor.

Other multilateral debt service payment in the period include $116.48 million to the International Development Association (IDA), $43.89 million to the African Development Bank (AfDB), $14.48 million to the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD), and $5.83 million to the Islamic Development Bank (IsDB).

For commercial creditors, Nigeria paid $430.53 million in debt servicing, representing 39.9 per cent of the total external debt service.

The DMO data showed that the highest debt service in the commercial category of $280.16 million was paid on Syndicated Loans, while $148.57 million was paid on Eurobond debt.

It further showed that $1.54 million was made to UniCredit S.P.A, $144,000 was paid to Standard Chartered Bank, and $108,000 was made to Deutsche Bank AG as debt service.

According to the DMO, debt service to bilateral lenders stood at $46.85 million, representing 4.3 per cent of the total.

It showed that the highest debt service payment in the bilateral category was made to France’s Agence Française de Développement (AFD), which received $33.13 million.

It was followed by Germany (KfW) with $11.84 million, while China Development Bank received $1.88 million.

However, the DMO showed that no debt service payments were recorded to Japan, China Exim Bank, or India Exim Bank in Q4 2024.

Nigeria’s public debt rose to N144.67 trillion at the end of 2024

Recall that the DMO recently disclosed that Nigeria’s total public debt surged to N144.67 trillion ($94.23 billion) as of December 31, 2024, a 48.58 per cent rise compared to N97.34 trillion ($108.23 billion) recorded at the end of 2023. 

The DMO data showed that the country’s external debt grew by 83.89 per cent year-on-year from N38.22 trillion ($42.50 billion) in December 2023 to N70.29 trillion ($45.78 billion) in December 2024. 

The increase was largely attributed to new borrowings and the continued depreciation of the naira, which raised the naira value of foreign-currency loans.

Nigeria’s debt servicing surges to $3.53 billion in first 9 months of 2024

Meanwhile, TheRadar earlier reported that the cost of servicing Nigeria’s external debt increased from $2.56 billion in 2023 to $3.53 billion in the first nine months of 2024.

According to the International Payment Data of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), the amount represents a year-on-year increase of $970 million or 38 per cent.