- The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is striving to improve market efficiency and make the capital market attractive to the youth.
- The SEC is encouraging capital market operators to develop technology that makes it easier for young people to invest.
- The Commission is also working to protect investors and prevent market manipulation.
The Securities and Exchange Commission said it is striving to improve market efficiency and to make the capital market attractive to the youth especially now that the demographics of the market is greying rapidly.
The Director General of the SEC, Mr Lamido Yuguda, stated this during a media parley in Lagos.
SEC’s commitment to digitisation efforts
He explained that the Commission will continue to collaborate with various market stakeholders to support the impactful digitalization of the capital market. He said:
- “The demographics of the capital market currently is greying and that is one of the things the Commission is tackling with the Revised Capital Market Master Plan.
- “We are encouraging Capital Market operators to develop the technology. The youths do not want to come in and start filling out five-page forms because they want to access the market, they want to pick up their phones and make their investments.”
Additionally, the SEC expressed their intention to introduce Fintech companies, recognizing them as a crucial gateway for youths to enter the market. They emphasized their awareness of this importance and their active efforts to work towards it.
The success of SEC’s past digitisation efforts
He further highlighted the positive impact of electronic Initial Public Offering (e-IPO), which resulted in over 100,000 new accounts being opened on the CSCS, primarily among youths and women.
He also emphasized the significance of these demographic groups for sustainable growth and acknowledged their efforts to improve Know Your Customer processes and other aspects to simplify their experience.
Other improvements so far made by SEC
As part of the digital transformation, the SEC DG disclosed that the Commission signed an MoU, last year, with the African Development Bank to enable the SEC to have a surveillance system.
- “This surveillance system is a system that allows the SEC, the regulator as a watchdog, to truly see transactions in the market live as they are happening, just to make sure that no market manipulation is happening.
- “Right now, we tried to get this information but basically, it’s with a lag but with the system that we are getting, it’s real-time. This will help this market; this will help the operators themselves.
- The regulator has their eyes on the market then people who are tempted to do any market manipulation will think twice before they do that. That is healthier for the market,” he stated.
Yuguda emphasized that when capital markets are developed, the entire engine of savings and investments and the allocation of resources would have the highest expected returns.
- “It is made easy and if you do that, you will create more jobs in the economy and more revenues for the government.
- Life will be made easier for the investors and because of that, you will have a lot of interested parties that want to put in their own money to help the capital market to develop” he added.
Why it’s important for the youth to participate in the capital market
Yuguda said that the youths must understand that the capital market is a viable platform for wealth creation, assuring them that the SEC and the market are working on how best to serve them.
- “We are striving to improve the way we deliver our products, to improve market efficiency, and to make the market attractive to them.
- “Most importantly, we are doing all we can to ensure that investors are adequately protected in the market and that they can get the benefits of their investments,” he stated.
Why won’t the age of capital market enthusiasts age? Since 1999, Nigerians have been wired to live in the short term. According to Maynard keynes, in the long term we might all be dead. Everybody thinks about now and not the future. The future will will take care of itself. Thank God, the pension refom and it’s RSA is helping the people to live onto the future but more can still be done
The financial inclusion.policy.od CBN was defective as it favours only the banks yet capital market contributed part of the funds
The dumb guys in NGX made matters worse by closing their branches preferring technology to do the job fornl.them. Nigeria is perhaps the only country where the citizens prefer to be swindled under a ponzi arrangement than invest in a well structured market. I doubt if we have yo to 1m ACTIVE retail investors in a country of over 220m population. SEC is part of the problem anyway. All the unclaimed funds from delisted companies was cornered by SEC. Among these were Berec, dangote flour etc. Give investors their funds so they can.invest and build the needed confidence. A situation where SEC is behaving like a ponzi scheme will be counterproductive. It takes ages for applications to be approved. Now we have private bond market because of the failure of a regulator. All SEC and NGX are concerned with is primarily fees and corruption.
The DG, says in his quote; we are doing all we can in ensure investors adequate protection in the market and they can get the benefits of their investment, but the commission has in their custody shareholders payoff of DANGOTE Flourmills since 2019, they took over this account from EDC Registrars, this is new to shareholders, whose confidence they should be restoring and market operators hands is tighter behind their back! Haba