Stakeholders in the Nigerian capital market are set for the 2013 edition of BusinessDay annual capital market conference which seeks to address how to achieve $1 trillion capital market by 2016.
The conference with the theme ‘Increasing Liquidity for a $1 trillion Capital Market by 2016’ holds on Wednesday, March 20, at the Civic Center, Victoria Island, Lagos.
Arunma Oteh, director general, Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), would deliver keynote speech in this year’s conference which is sponsored by FBN Capital Limited, CBO Capital Partners with the support of Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) and NASD plc.
Confirmed speakers and panelists are Oscar Onyema, managing director/chief executive officer, Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE); Luca del Conte, associate director, Capital Markets, Exotix, United Kingdom; Bola Ajomale, managing director/chief executive officer (CEO), NASD plc; Val Uche Obi, partner, Alliance Law Firm; Bex Nwawudu, director, CBO Capital Partners; Eyo Ekpo, commissioner, markets, rates & competition, Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC); and Hewett Adeboyega Benson, executive director, Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON).
This year’s conference would be examining how to improve market liquidity for equities and bonds with perspectives from the regulator, operators, unlisted companies; improving liquidity to attract the big caps; how to increase capitalisation and liquidity of the Exchange (through initial public offerings (IPOs) or hybrid option; how to get the stock market to mirror the real economy; creating the environment for issuance of corporate debt; corporate governance and pension funds; reducing risks to raising corporate bonds; and can PFAs appoint independent directors?
Other areas of discourse would include policies to catalyse market liquidity and depth; return of the retail investor – financial literacy and investor protection; which new asset classes/investment instruments will develop investor base; power privatisation and the prospects for the capital market; the place of technology in enhancing liquidity and depth on the Exchange.
Suffice to say that with a current market capitalisation of approximately $100 billion, listed securities on the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) will have to grow by about 900 percent over the next four years to achieve $1 trillion market capitalisation target by 2016. To attain this target, the market capitalisation of the Exchange will have to approximately double every year in the next three years.
IHEANYI NWACHUKWU
