The 180-Day Clock: What Nigeria's Export Proceeds Rule Does to an Exporter's Cash Cycle

Imagine an exporter in Lagos who ships a container of sesame seeds to a buyer in Europe. The buyer is a long-standing customer, and the contract allows payment 150 days after the bill of lading date. For years, that was a comfortable arrangement. Since 8 January 2025, it is a narrow one.

On that date the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) issued a circular ending approvals for requests to extend the deadline for repatriating export proceeds. Authorised dealer banks can no longer ask for extensions on behalf of their exporter customers. Non-oil proceeds must be credited to the exporter's domiciliary account within 180 days of the bill of lading date, and oil and gas proceeds within 90 days (ThisDay, 10 January 2025).

The rule is easy to state. Its effect on an exporter's cash cycle is harder to see, and that is where the risk sits.

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Where does the clock actually start?

The 180 days run from the bill of lading, not from delivery and not from payment. Everything the exporter does before loading sits outside the window. Everything after loading counts against it: the voyage, clearance at the destination, the buyer's inspection, the buyer's payment terms and the time a bank needs to credit the account.

Take the sesame exporter again. A buyer who pays on day 150 leaves 30 days of margin. A quality dispute that takes six weeks to settle uses all of it, and the exporter is out of compliance through no failure of its own.

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Which exporters carry the most risk?

Stren & Blan Partners, in a note published on 7 February 2025, argued that the circular does not account for deferred-payment arrangements between buyers and sellers with long relationships, barter-style trades in which imports offset exports, or payment delays caused by disputes and sanctions.

Smaller exporters have the thinnest buffers. The West African Association for Cross-Border Trade in Agro-forestry-pastoral and Fisheries Products told Shipping Position in early February 2025 that small and medium-sized exporters were the most affected and that many had not seen the circular. Its president added that larger firms such as PZ, Dangote and Olam are less exposed, because they have established financial structures and overseas networks. Exporters selling into Ghana, Togo and Liberia also convert currencies on every transaction, which adds delay and cost.

We read this as a shift in who carries timing risk. Before the circular, a late payment could be absorbed through an extension. Now the exporter absorbs it, or the contract has to prevent it.

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What does a workable response look like?

It starts with the contract. Payment terms should sit well inside 180 days of the bill of lading, with room for a dispute to be settled and a transfer to clear. Where a buyer needs longer credit, the exporter should agree a structure with its authorised dealer before the goods ship, because a conversation after the bill of lading is issued is already late.

It continues with tracking. Each shipment needs its own repatriation date, calculated on the day the bill of lading is issued. An exporter selling small lots to many buyers needs this most. A simple register is enough to begin with: bill of lading date, due date, amount, payment status and bank reference, reviewed every week. Shipments approaching day 120 without payment can then be escalated while there is still time to act.

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What the rule does and does not solve

As Stren & Blan describe it, the CBN's aim was to stop exporters from holding back proceeds while they waited for a better exchange rate, a practice that weakened foreign-exchange inflows. The rule addresses that behaviour directly. It does not address exporters whose proceeds are late for commercial reasons, and those are the exporters most likely to be penalised by it.

Whether the rule raises inflows will depend on how many exporters can hold to the clock. That turns less on the circular than on the contracts they sign and the records they keep.