More Nigerians are abandoning their banks' accounts majorly due to economic hardship caused by sluggish economic growth, rising job losses and reduction in purchasing power occasioned by double digit inflation.
Statistics from the Nigeria Interbank Settlement System (NIBSS) showed that Nigerians abandoned 10 million bank accounts in 2018.
NIBSS is owned by all Nigerian banks and the Central Bank of Nigeria, (CBN).
Emefiele, CBN gov.
According to the company, the number of bank accounts abandoned by bank customers and hence categorised as ‘inactive bank accounts’ rose by 28 percent to 46.7 million in 2018 from 36.7 million in 2017.
This implies that in just one year, ten million bank accounts recorded zero transactions.
According to Vanguard newspapers, the factors responsible for the rise in inactive bank accounts are economic downturn/business failures and inactivity on salary accounts due to loss of job.
There are also the issues associated with fraud; and inability to complete Bank Verification Number (BVN) initiative.
BVN is a centralized biometric identification system for each Nigerian banking customer.
