Capital Markets

Despite multiple trading platforms, a variety of debt instruments and a range of institutional investors, both domestic and foreign, Nigeria’s capital markets are relatively underdeveloped, accounting for only 11% of GDP in 2017, compared to a global average of 98.5% in 2016. Additionally, the authorities have not yet solved investors’ liquidity challenge and most domestics firms’ difficulties accessing finance. Furthermore, Nigeria wants to use capital markets to raise funds for infrastructure, the need for which is greater than what the federal budget and funding mechanisms are able to provide. Reforms to the sector are expected to play a role in infrastructure development in the near future, as new rules for pension funds are set to allow individual account holders to select risk-based investment approaches. This chapter contains interviews with Oscar N Onyema, CEO, Nigerian Stock Exchange; Ibukun Adebayo, Head of Middle East, Africa and South Asia, International Markets Unit, London Stock Exchange Group; Kayode Akinkugbe, Managing Director and CEO, FBNQuest Merchant Bank; and Chinua Azubike, Managing Director and CEO, InfraCredit.