• Thursday, March 28, 2024
businessday logo

BusinessDay

CFAN to launch shares exchange for co-operatives in Nigeria

CFAN to launch shares exchange for co-operatives in Nigeria

The National Co-operative Financing Agency of Nigeria (CFAN), in what is being described by stakeholders as a novel idea, is set to launch a Co-operative Shares Exchange initiative centred around Co-operatives in the country.

CFAN is the national financial body for all registered Co-operative Societies that offer financial services to their members in Nigeria.

In a sensitisation workshop held in Lagos recently, Adebola Orolugbabe, the President/Chairman, Board of Directors of CFAN, said the idea of the Shares Exchange is to have a financial instrument for the transfer, buying and selling of Co-operative Shares.

Read also: Adopting blockchain technology could solve Nigeria’s energy crises – experts

“CFAN intends to list the shares of viable Co-operatives that comply with laid down procedures on an OTC or BlockChain platform and to trade these shares amongst its members. We will also use the OTC/BlockChain platform to promote and to trade approved Co-operative securities so as to raise capital in the market.”

Also speaking at the workshop, Eric Olo, the Managing Director of E-Percent, said the Shares Exchange will have a digital registry to maintain all the records of the Co-operatives for ease of access uniformity, and as a way of maintaining compliance for the Exchange, and will be an asset management platform that ensures liquidity, risk mitigation and diversification for Co-operatives on the Exchange.

While delivering his paper, Abubakar Lawal, another keynote speaker and the Chief Executive Officer of GTI Capital, stated that the Shares Exchange will create financial freedom and redistribution of wealth among Co-operative Societies.

The workshop was a crystallization of over six years of work developed by CFAN, GTI Capital and E-Percent, with the aim of adding value to co-operative shares and opening up the capital market space. When it finally comes on stream, stakeholders expect that the Shares Exchange would help create about 150,000 direct jobs and over 300,000 indirect jobs across Nigeria.