SEC asks young Nigerians to avoid Ponzi Schemes

Young Nigerians have been urged to ensure they invest with entities that are registered by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

Nestor Ikeagu, Director, Market Development Department of the SEC stated this weekend during the celebration of the Global Money week 2023 enlightenment campaign to School for the Gifted, Gwagwalada, Abuja.

Global Money Week (GMW) is an annual global awareness-raising campaign on the importance of ensuring that young people from an early age are financially aware, and are gradually acquiring the knowledge, skills, attitudes and behaviors necessary to make sound financial decisions and ultimately achieve financial well-being and financial resilience.

The SEC Director said that the official theme for Global Money Week 2023 is “Plan your money, plant your future”, adding that this year, GMW focuses on sustainability and raising awareness on the implications of individual financial behavior not only on one’s financial future but also on the environment and the society.
Ikeagu stated that there are various products available in the capital market that could appeal to the youths and urged them to plan, save and invest in the capital market.

According to him, “It is also important to educate these young minds that as they plant their future, they should be mindful of some fraudulent activities such as “Ponzi scheme”, that can mar the growth of that financial future.
“A Ponzi scheme is a fraudulent investing scam promising high rates of return with little risk to investors. It is a fraudulent investing scam which generates returns for earlier investors with money taken from later investors. It involves paying existing investors in a non-existing enterprise with the funds collected from new investors”.

Ikeagu added that there is a list of registered fund managers on the website of the SEC and urged members of the public to always cross check that entities are registered for the products they are offering to the public.
Mrs. Ngozi Obi, Senior Manager Financial Inclusion Department of the SEC, told the students GMW is an annual event enlightening the youth on saving money to invest for the future via the capital market.

She said, “It is an annual global awareness raising campaign on the importance of ensuring that young people from an early age are financially aware and are gradually acquiring knowledge and skills, attitude, behaviours necessary to make sound financial decisions and ultimately achieve financial well-being and financial resilience.

“The aim of our visit here today is to create awareness to the youth as part of the financial literacy to educate the youth and get them acquainted with the financial culture to enable them make informed decisions before investments,” she stated.

Speaking earlier, Rilwan Abubakar, Principal of the School expressed appreciation to the SEC for choosing the school for the awareness campaign saying that it is a special day for the students who stand to benefit a lot to enable them learn how to invest.

“We are very excited that the SEC has decided to hold this event in our school. It is a global money week with the aim educating the youth on finances and create awareness to be financially disciplined, and we know our students will benefit greatly from this”