Sterling Bank yesterday formally stated the facts surrounding its branch in Ado Ekiti. This is contained in a statement sent by Ademola Adesina, its Public Relations and News Management unit.
The bank stated:
The Naira notes referenced were received prior to the re-configuration of the branch’s Automated Teller Machines (ATMs) to dispense the 200 Naira denomination.
On January 23, 2023, a regulatory official visited our branch in AdoEkiti and the vault contained N 6,000,000 in N 200 denominations.
During the visit, the official observed that we had ran out of N1,000 and N500 notes on that day and were unable to load the N200 as the ATMs had not yet been configured to dispense N200 notes.
At the time of the visit, the subsisting instruction was that the newly designed notes were not to be dispensed over the counter.
All our ATMs have been dispensing the available quantities of the N1000 and N500 denominations of the newly designed currency as received since the commencement of the policy. We have also successfully reconfigured our ATMs nationwide to dispense N200 notes.
All denominations can now be withdrawn from our ATMs and over the counter in line with regulatory pronouncement on February 2, 2023. We hereby confidently assure the public that the branch was not hoarding any funds and that Sterling remains at the forefront of ensuring that this exercise is a resounding success.
Together, we will all overcome this inconvenience and come out stronger.”