HURRAY! Banks employ more staff — first time in 2017

The banking sector employed 6,924 more people in the third quarter, this is the first time in 2017 that it increased its workforce.

According to the Q3 banking sector data released by the National Bureau of Statistics, the staff strength in the sector increased from 75,607 in the second quarter to 82,531 people in the third quarter.

In the first quarter of the year, 77,096 people had been employed in the private sector but the figure reduced to 75,607 in the three months that led to the second quarter.

A breakdown of the data showed that the number of executive staff from 161 to 197 while senior staff increased from 19,826 people to 20,420 people.

The number of junior staff increased from 33,783 in the second quarter to 35,191 in the third quarter. Contract staff in the sector increased from 21,837 people to 26,723 people.

A total of 213,693,964 transactions valued at N19.33 trillion were recorded in Q3 2017 on electronic payment channels in the Nigerian banking sector.

“NIBSS Instant Payment (NIP) transactions dominated the volume of transactions recorded. 97,530,856 volume of NIP transactions valued at N13,963 bln were recorded in Q3 2017,” the report read.

“In terms of credit to private sector, a total of N15.83 trn worth of credit was allocated by the banks in Q3 2017. Oil & Gas and Manufacturing sectors got credit allocation of N3.54 trn and N2.27 trn to record the highest credit allocation in the period under review.”