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Zero Equilibrium Macro and Market Watch: The Week In Markets.

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By Chinedu Okoye  Synopsis: • This week is markets have been characterized by escalationofnthe Iranian - Israeli conflict, which has led to the blockade of the Straits of Hormuz, the channel where most Middle Eastern Oil passes through to their intended destinations. • The conflict which has taken Crude Oil prices to the $90s levels with a tightened spread at $2.34/barrel (the difference between BRENT and WTI Crude benchmarks). • Brent initially outpaced WTI at the beginning of the trading week, but the katte caught up as market demand spilled over to the cheaper WTI. Precious metals were negative on the week, but held above support levels, while crude returned double-digit gains. • Equities fell across developed markets and economically advanced EM, with Europe taking the largest hit. • The US Dollar gained against it's major peers, as the DXY hit the 99 before settling at 98.5 levels. However, the other traditional safe haven assets - Treasuries- also saw declines in...
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ZE Market Watch: Oil, Dollar Strength and the Return of Emerging Market Volatility

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By Chinedu Okoye  Market Snapshot: The past week has seen emerging market currencies weaken against the U.S. dollar as geopolitical tensions intensified across the Middle East. Risk-sensitive assets have retreated, with the MSCI Emerging Market Currency Index closing mid-week in negative territory, reversing part of the rally seen over the past several months. At the same time, global markets have witnessed an unusual alignment of asset price movements: the U.S. dollar strengthened, gold prices firmed as investors sought safe havens, and BRENT crude rose toward the $80–$83 range This coordinated movement across currencies, commodities and safe-haven assets is seen as a risk-off repositioning in global markets rather than a fundamental deterioration in emerging market economic conditions. The Macro Catalyst: The current volatility is largely driven by geopolitical risk premiums entering energy markets. Ad, historically, geopolitical conflicts involving key oil-producing ...
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Is Nigeria’s FX Reserves Surge A Monetary Triumph or Minskyan Mirage of Stability?

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By Chinedu Okoye  The Net FX Reserves Surge: Nigeria’s gross external reserves recently hit about $50.45 billion as of mid-February 2026, a 13‑year high, which alone is remarkable however even more striking, net reserves jumped from roughly $3.99 billion at end‑2023 to $34.80 billion by end‑2025, a 770+% increase in two years.  This extraordinary two-year rise is attributable mainly to the data-driven policies and a combination of bold exchange rate reforms (Naira float) and favorable external conditions. Lower developed market sovereign Bond yields, increasing the yield differential, thereby attracting foreign investors participation.  (Source CBN Database) Other factors are only just recently coming into to play as the CBN Governor credits the rise in FX reserves to stronger oil earnings, improved transparency, and booming remittances. Indeed, by late Feb 2026 Nigeria could cover almost 9.7 months of imports with these buffers.  ...
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Zero Equilibrium Policy Commentary and Propositions for Mitigating FX Concentration Risks as Nigerian Foreign Reserves hit $49 billion.

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By Chinedu Okoye Summary: • Nigeria’s economy used to be dependent on Oil receipts for foreign-exchange (FX) inflows. • Over the past decade, diaspora remittances have become the single largest FX source outside oil, accounting for roughly 10%-12% of GDP. • We recognize the benefits and risks associated with this development, and profer possible fiscal and monetary policy solutions to help mitigate these risks, as Nigeria's foreign reserves hit a high.  Improvements in FX Inflows from Diasporan Remittances:   Official figures show Nigeria received about US$19.5 billion in remittances in 2023 and this was a 2.9% decline from 2022. By mid-2024 and early 2025, remittances rose to record highs, hitting $553 million in July 2024 and $5.3 billion in Q2 2025, after the Cardoso led CBN's liberalization FX markets. A vast majority of these flows originate from Europe and North America, and mostly  from three countries, the US, UK, Canada. Switzerland and Italy are oth...
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A Critical Review of Hayek's ‘Prices and Production’: Part I/V

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- Compiled By Chinedu Okoye  Lecture 1: Theories of the Influence of Money on Prices: The Dependence of Production activity on Money: Hayek begins by acknowledging the impact of money on both the volume and direction of production. He cited the war and post war inflation and the return to gold standard by countries like Britain which was achieved through a a monetary contraction. At the present moment she said, “the best minds believe the cause of the existing world-wide depression to be a scarcity of gold” as they sought monetary means to overcome it. Thus, though from different angles, it agrees with the Minskian perspective, that money affects production activity (investment and output). Up until the point of this publication, Hayek asserts that little progress made in understanding the connection between money and prices (if money affects production or does affect prices as well), and of general doctrines in the preceding century. The fundamental problems in the fie...
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ZE Oil Market Outlook: Crude Makes a Comeback.

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- By Chinedu Okoye  Overview: In the last blog post titled: “Could Crude be Making a Comeback?” , the breakaway from previous ranges and the testing of new highs were noted. However we cautioned that it was likely shortlived, stating bearish factors like demand, consumer straight and confidence in the worlds largest economies and continuous US production. The bullish case was grossly underestimated, leading to a reality different from what was anticipated, as oil now at $68.21 (BRENT) and $64.11 (WTI).  (BRENT Week-on-week) This stronger than anticipated move is due to factors that wasn't factored, and would seem improbable at the time, probing to be powerful support, lifting prices way above the target we had it for H12026. (WTI Week-on-week) What We Missed: Factors driving this rally were not fully anticipated or appreciated at the time of the last post and these have been c rucial to this rally. The factors include; a weak USD, tighter s...
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Commodity Watch: Could Crude be Making a Comeback?

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By Chinedu Okoye  Overview: Crude oil prices breached resistance levels of $59 for WTI and $63 for BRENT) within the week. With BRENT settling at  $64.13 and WTI around $59.44, a marginal break  to an otherwise sideways market. This move follows ongoing geopolitical tensions, news and/or events (the US - “Venezuelan incident”, Iran tensions, etc.) and short-covering before the long weekend – these factors are fundamentally driving prices. On a technical basis , both benchmarks have broken above the prior highs at around $63 (BRENT) and $59 (WTI). Week-on-week they're both up by 1% (BRENT 1.2%, WTI 0.9%), month-on-month they are up roughly +8% , yet year-over-year they remain down about –19% and ( BRENT )  and –22 % (WTI) , reflecting how far prices fell in 2025. From this, it can be observed that Crude is slowly clawing back from its lows but still sits well below 2024 levels. The rally is modest, and held by short-term factors, and not yet a broad bre...
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