After a record positive close in November, Nigeria’s equities market open the month of December on a negative note, decreasing slightly by 0.01 percent or N2billion on Thursday.
The equities market’s positive return year-to-date (YtD) decreased to +11.55 percent on Thursday.
The Nigerian Exchange Limited (NGX) All Share Index (ASI) and equities market capitalisation decreased from 47,660.04 points and N25.959trillion respectively to 47,656.64 points and N25.957trillion.
Honeywell Flour Mills share price dropped most, from N2.28 to N2.10, down by 18kobo or 7.89percent. It was followed by Wema Bank, which dipped from N3.30 to N3.12, also losing 18kobo or 5.45percent, and FCMB Group which dropped from a high of N3.35 to N3.21, losing 14kobo or 4.18percent.
Read also: Nigeria stock market rises further on increased bargain
FCMB Group, Courteville, Access Corporation, UBA and Zenith Bank were top-5 traded stocks on the Nigerian Exchange Limited. In 3,073 deals, investors exchanged 172,895,498 shares valued at N2.843billion.
The Nigerian Exchange Limited (NGX) on Thursday said that it has helped facilitate the raising of about N3.5trillion for the Federal, State Governments and corporate organisations so far in 2022, as part of its objective in positioning the capital market as the prime location for raising capital.
Jude Chiemeka, Divisional Head, Capital Markets, NGX stated this while giving his remarks at the Nigeria Integrated National Financing Framework (INFF) dialogue on a TV programme with the theme “How Can Nigeria Finance its Development Priorities.” INFF emanated as a result of a partnership between FG, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), and European Union (EU) to support Nigeria in mobilising greater amounts of private and public resources to finance its development agenda.
Chiemeka stated that the capital market could serve as the primary source of bulk mobilisation of capital to finance developmental projects and NGX had implemented an array of incentives, programmes and capacity building workshops for investors. “The pension fund industry for example has been able to leverage the issuances done by the DMO in recent times and a lot of financing has come from them.
“As an exchange, we provide the platform that will enable the government to finance projects through green instruments that these investors can invest in and ultimately benefit from the returns. And that is why it’s critical to ensure there’s constant investor education, sound governance and regulation. If you take a look at the recently revamped Capital Market Masterplan, there’s a conversation there around increasing retail investor participation in our markets.”
He said the goal is to revamp the current active retail participation level to 5 million by 2025. “NGX has been able to facilitate the raise of about N3.5trillion since January 2021 for corporates federal and state governments. We are very well equipped to support the financing of these capital projects because we have the platform, right partnerships both domestic and international. Today, you talk about the African Exchanges Linkage Project which commenced on November 18 and will be launched in December. That gives Nigeria the ability to leverage the investor base in other capital markets to fund the projects to grow the economy and lift people out of poverty.”
