Nigeria's central bank finishes a two-day meeting today. The question is whether borrowing gets cheaper. It's a question for people who already have access to credit.

The Central Bank of Nigeria's Monetary Policy Committee began its 307th meeting on September 21 and concludes today, September 22, when Governor Olayemi Cardoso is expected to announce whether the benchmark interest rate moves from its current 26.5 per cent. The rate has sat there since February, after three straight months of falling inflation gave the Committee room to consider a cut, and rising global oil prices since then have given it a reason to hold instead.

Most analysts tracking the meeting expect the Committee to hold again, watching a Middle East conflict that has pushed Brent crude above $100 a barrel and could feed back into domestic fuel and transport costs if it isn't careful. Headline inflation has eased for three consecutive months, down to 15.39 per cent in August from 15.43 per cent in July. Gross external reserves reached $54.67 billion as of September 16, an 18-year high, according to a pre-MPC analysis from Cordros, giving the CBN more room to defend the naira without raising rates further. Whether the disinflation trend survives a global oil shock is exactly what today's decision is trying to price in.The rate is a direct lever on formal credit, financial markets and the government's own borrowing costs. An unlicensed artisanal miner isn't sitting in the formal credit system the MPC regulates, and the CBN's communiqué will not mention Minna. The two stories are landing on the same day because Nigeria's formal economy and its informal one run on entirely different sets of rules, and only one of them gets a press conference.