Unclaimed dividend stands at N190bn, says SEC

Dayo Obisan, executive commissioner in charge of operations at Securities Exchange Commission (SEC) has said that unclaimed dividend in Nigeria stands at N190 billion.

He said this on Friday at the post Capital Market Committee (CMC) press briefing. The SEC and Capital Market community held the CMC meeting on August 24, followed by press briefing on August 25.

Lamido Yuguda, director general, SEC also mentioned some of the reforms the commission is currently undergoing.

“What we are currently doing in the Capital Market are reforms on custody, derivatives, trading, commodities exchange, in-house reforms (regulators) making them more efficient and technology friendly, crowdfunding, and global advisors,” he said.

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Yuguda said that unclaimed dividends are a very serious problem because of several issues like identification issues, and multiple subscriptions, and also because a lot of companies have changed their name.

“We are now tightening our Know Your Customers (KYC) requirements so that all information needed will be fully captured and these unclaimed dividends will be a thing of the past,” he said.

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The SEC DG noted that he sees no problems with companies listing dollar bonds.

“I don’t see any problem with dollar bonds, any bond should be an obligation that is backed by the obligation to pay the bond. What matters is that the issuer of the bond is able to pay both principal and interest on the bond,” he said.

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The DG spoke of the commission’s intentions to continue to offer products that are suitable to investors and has hence revised the Capital Market master plan.

“The capital market has a ten-year master plan from 2015-2025, We did a midterm review of the plan to revise the plan, and it has helped us achieve a lot and we continue to see these achievements in 2023,” he said.