Nigeria: PMI eases from record high in April
The Stanbic IBTC Bank Nigeria Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) receded from 58.8 in March to 58.1 in April. March’s reading had marked a record high. Despite the fall, the PMI still lies at a historically high rate and far above the 50-point threshold that separates expansion from contraction in business conditions, pointing to robust growth in the private sector.
April’s strong performance was driven by record output growth and strong inflows of new orders. Signaling tightening capacity at firms, backlogs of work rose and jobs were added at a healthy pace. On the price front, input price inflation rose to the highest level since February 2014 in April.