Spotlight Stories
CAMA: What government hopes to achieve – PwC’s Taiwo Oyedele explains
Oyedele said CAMA would impact Nigeria’s ease of doing business and attract investment and economic growth.
A clear implementation of the CAMA guidelines would be needed to bridge the lack of trust between the FG and the masses, according to Mr. Taiwo Oyedele, Partner and Head, Tax Regulatory Service, PwC Nigeria.
Mr. Oyedele disclosed this at the PwC’s Capability Enhancement Workshop for Journalists on Wednesday afternoon.
He added that, “The new CAMA is the most significant business legislation in Nigeria, which would impact Nigeria’s ease of doing business and also attract investment and economic growth.
“The new Companies and Allied Matters Act 2020 is not an amendment but a reenactment of the older law.”
READ: Stella Okoli: The woman who built a pharmaceutical giant from a small store
On the major provisions of the law, he acknowledged that the new CAMA has over 800 sections which is over 200 more than the old one as the government made more measures for administrative roles, including arrangements to rescue a company which gives the government the means to rescue a failing business.
For private businesses, Mr. Oyedele cited the reduction of fees and charges as commendable; the same went for the introduction of limited liability partnerships.
A private company is a company with less than 50 shareholders, under the new CAMA. A private company must have a turnover of less than N120 million and N60 million in net assets, which was N2 million and N1 million respectively in the older regulations. Also, having an AGM is no longer mandatory.
READ: 7 key changes made to the amended Companies and Allied Matters Act (CAMA)
For public companies, he praised the provisions that enable the promotion of futures and derivatives in Nigerian public companies, adding that if Nigeria had a monetary market for futures trading, it would reduce pressure on the FX market.
He also praised the new rule that prohibits the disclosure of owners of the company’s shares as bearer names, which would enable more transparency in the sector.
On the CAC replacing trustees, he said, “The FG is not trying to control the organizations, but regulate to ensure efficiency, since money may be involved in non-profit registered organizations like large churches.
READ: Nigerian Bottling Company installs high-speed canning line at Ikeja Plant
“CAC does not have the power to remove a pastor, but safeguards must be built so that the CAMA provisions are not abused,” he said, adding that “Clear implementations of the guidelines are needed, due to consequences like lack of trust between the FG and the masses.”
Mr. Oyedele opined that the guideline implementations must reach the subnational level to address the issues of over-regulation on smaller business owners on the local government level.
“Nigeria needs to repeal the multiplicity of taxes and levies charged, seeing as 95% of taxes come from 5 major tax sources. Also needed would be capacity and management skills for small business owners, infrastructure to enable a better business environment and more institutional reforms,” he said.
On the next step to be taken, he urged that CAMA should be in line with authentication acts. He added that complementary reforms were needed to harmonize the inconsistent regulations, while also stating that continuous improvement would be needed on the CAMA, considering global best practices and not waiting another 30 years for new reviews.
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Nairametrics reported last month that the Special Adviser to the President on Ease of Doing Business, Dr. Jumoke Oduwole, said that the new Companies and Allied Matters Act 2020, CAMA, would reduce the regulatory burden on businesses in Nigerian and improve ease of doing business in the ecosystem. Dr. Oduwole said the changes in the new CAMA were well received by business leaders.
Some of the new regulations include: new electronic filing of company shares, which was pushed by the SEC; Single shareholder structure for businesses; and SMEs not requiring the services of auditors, virtual meetings and others which would make it easier to do business in Nigeria.
Market Views
Zoom is 3 times bigger than Nigeria’s Stock Market Capitalization
Zoom sported a market valuation of $131 billion, compared to the Nigerian Stock market with a value standing at $42.1 billion.
The world’s fastest-growing video conferencing service company, Zoom, has seen its market valuation rocket past $130 billion—more than 3 times the value of the Nigerian Stock Exchange.
Zoom has attracted high demand growth for its service, especially since COVID-19 changed the way the world works. As one of the pioneers of modern work-from-home tools, millions of organizations around the world have adopted the application as their preferred communication tool in the workplace, particularly video conferencing.
READ: Zoom reports a surge in profit of 3,300%
READ: How Apple lost over $500 billion in 12 trading days
What we know: At the time of drafting this report, Zoom sported a market valuation of $131 billion, compared to the Nigerian Stock market with a value presently standing at $42.1 billion (N16 trillion), using the official exchange rate of N380 to $1.
- Zoom’s enviable performance began in early 2020, when it printed a market capitalization of just $19 billion. While Zoom posted $1.35 billion in revenue over the past 12 months, the Nigerian Stocks bourse, in comparison, printed a market capitalization of $39.1 Billion (N14.87 trillion) at the end of January, according to data obtained from Nairalytics (financial data arm of Nairametrics).
- The bullish run got intensified for the tech company, particularly in Q2 that ended August 31, when it posted an impressive earning result of $663.5 million in revenue (far beating analysts’ prediction of $500.5 million)—and it still firing on all cylinders.
- Such gains seen in Zoom’s stock price have added so much wealth to its investors, that Zoom founder, Eric Yuan, has seen his own fortune rise more than 551% year to date, with a valuation put at about $23.2 billion, according to data seen from Bloomberg Billionaire Index.
READ: Nigeria’s records 6.1 percent tax to GDP as tax base for VAT rise to N23.7 trillion
READ: COVID-19: How CBN policies helped prevent the collapse of the Nigerian economy – Oscar Onyema
Eric Yuan is presently the chairman and CEO of Zoom Video Communications, the world’s biggest provider of video conferencing software to the business.
On the other hand, Nigerian stocks also defied expectations and produced positive returns, with every month in the third quarter, printing positive returns as buying pressure increased across the market spectrum. The Nigerian stock market’s performance was triggered by the Industrial Index emerging as the biggest gainer, up by 8.14% followed by the most liquid index, banking index (10.08%), and the Consumer Index printing (2.74%), still market capitalization hovered below $40 billion.
READ: Nigeria imported N1.28 trillion “used vehicles”, motorcycle in one year, up by 42%
Zoom has now boosted its revenue forecasts to $690 million for the present quarter (through the end of October), and also increased its financial guidance for the full fiscal year, through Jan 2021, to about $2.4 billion in revenue, up from $623 million for the year through January 2020, as it takes into account the demand for remote work solutions for businesses reaching a record high.
The exponential valuation seen in the world’s biggest video company had been enhanced by the fact that a significant amount of businesses and individuals now work remotely, on the bias of the world’s most disruptive biological pathogen COVID-19’s continued spread, triggering global investors to increase their buying pressure on the American communications technology company, which is barely less 10 years old in operation.
READ: MTN shareholders have made approximately N1 trillion since April 2020
Bottom-line: Covid-19 may have caused a lot of damage to the global economy since it was declared a pandemic in the first quarter of the year, but not for remote working app companies like Zoom, Slack, and Microsoft Teams.
- The US stock markets assign significant value to companies that can grow exponentially, as they believe these are companies that will continue to dominate the future of work.
- Just like US tech stocks, stocks on the Nigerian Stock Exchange have also gained significantly in the latter part of this year.
- However, rather than gaining from higher revenues growth, they have relied on Meffynomics (lower interest rate in a high inflation economy) to attract portfolio inflows from local investors.
Cryptocurrency
Rich investors are moving cryptos at an alarming rate
Over $1.5 billion worth of Bitcoins have been transferred from one point to another in more than 15 transactions.
Wealthy investors have lately intensified their moves at an astronomical rate, with the prevailing price seen at the world’s flagship crypto hovering above $13,000.
At the time of writing, over $1.5 billion worth of Bitcoins has been transferred from one point to another in more than 15 transactions less than 5 hours ago, as tracked by Nairametrics, thus giving a signal that wealthy investors are definitely up to something.
The most recent price movement captured by Nairametrics showed a BTC whale moving about $34 million worth of cryptos to Coinbase, the world’s most valuable crypto exchange company.
READ: Two strange Bitcoin whales transfer $290 million worth of Crypto
🚨 🚨 🚨 2,500 #BTC (33,671,694 USD) transferred from unknown wallet to #Coinbase
— Whale Alert (@whale_alert) October 31, 2020
READ: Ripple owners say XRP will be worth $100
Why you should know: In the crypto-verse, traders, or global investors who own large numbers of BTCs are typically called Bitcoin whales. This means a Bitcoin whale would be an individual or business entity (with a single Bitcoin address) owning around 1000 Bitcoins or more.
The number of large entities owning BTCs recently reached an all-time high amid Bitcoin’s ascension. By October 25, the number of large entities owning over 1000 BTCs increased to 2,231.
Whales could be anticipating a strong medium to long-term Bitcoin price trend, and are choosing to hold on to BTC in expectation of a bull market.
READ: 2 TRON whales transfer over 120,000,000 TRX
READ: Dual citizenship firm opens office in Nigeria for millionaires, charges over $1 million
What this means: much of the recent increase can be attributed to wealthy entities withdrawing their BTC from exchanges. Apparently, this is not new wealth; rather, it represents a change in the way Bitcoin whales are choosing to hold their coins.
Explore the Advanced Financial Calculators on Nairametrics
- That said, it’s critical to note these large entities are on record highs amid last week’s price ascension. Statistics obtained from BitcoinCharts revealed that Bitcoin whale addresses actually control a much higher 7,902,469 BTC, or 42% of the total supply.
- That brings an affirmative bias that these large entities’ movements are trajectory to price movements at unprecedented levels.
- This is an indication that more high-net-worth individuals are entering the space to invest in Bitcoin, in expectation of $BTC price appreciation.
- Bitcoin accumulation has been on a constant upward trend for months. 2.6M $BTC (14% of supply) are currently held in accumulation addresses.
ENDSARS
IGP says protesters attacked 205 public, private facilities
Data collated when the #End SARS peaceful protest started indicated that 14 states recorded major violence.
The Nigerian Police Force has stated that about 205 critical national security assets, corporate facilities and private properties were razed down and vandalized during the EndSARS protest, which was hijacked by hoodlums and arsonists.
This was disclosed by Mr Mohammed Adamu, the Inspector-General of Police, during a virtual conference of Senior Police Officers in Abuja, according to a news report by NAN.
READ: Buhari approves free business name registration for 250,000 SMEs
READ: #EndSARS: Our police reform agenda is a game changer to end impunity – Osinbajo
Adamu disclosed that data collated between Oct. 11, when the #End SARS peaceful protest started as a demonstration, and Oct. 27, after it was hijacked by the vandals, indicated that 14 states recorded major violence.
He said that some of the states severely affected by this civil unrest are Lagos, Edo, Delta, Oyo, Kano, Plateau, Osun, Ondo, Ogun, Rivers, Abia, Imo, Ekiti, and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT).
READ: #EndSARS: Joe Biden issues press release on violent crackdown of Protesters in Nigeria
The violence had resulted in attacks on critical national security infrastructure, other corporate and private properties, as well as injuries or fatalities to civilians, the police, and other security agents.
READ: #EndSARS: IMF Links protests to economic difficulties
What you should know
- 71 public warehouses and 248 privately owned stores were looted in the course of the protests nationwide.
- 51 civilian fatalities with 37 injured, and 22 policemen gruesomely murdered with 26 others injured were recorded during the protest.
- 10 firearms, including 8 AK 47 rifles, were carted away during the attack on police stations, and a locally made pistol had been recovered from elements operating under the guise of the EndSARS protest.
- 1,596 suspects have so far been arrested in connection with the violence and widespread looting across the country.
Explore the Advanced Financial Calculators on Nairametrics
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Nigeria’s food Inflation rises by 110.5% in five years
Rich investors are moving cryptos at an alarming rate
