ANOTHER BANKING CRISIS IMMINENT!: MOVE YOUR MONEY TO STRONG BANKS…EXPERT ADVISES

Mr. Ori Adeyemo, a Forensic Accountant and crusader for best practices in the banking industry, has warned that the Nigerian banking industry is facing an imminent collapse unless urgent and reasonable measures are taken by the Federal Government to curtail the slide into what he described as anarchy and chaos. 

“By the nature of my job, I am privy to the fact that the books of most Nigerian banks have been in very bad shape over a long time, not minding the spurious financial returns that they post to deceive gullible Nigerians from time to time.

“I am aware that anytime the year end of a bank is months away some banks stop all lending activities to embark on aggressive mobilization for deposits and engage vigorously in short-term inter-bank placements in order to jerk up their balance sheets.  I am aware that it is at this point in time that spurious bank charges unashamedly suddenly appear in the account of the customers if only for the purpose of declaring huge profits to the shareholders at the next Annual General Meeting (AGM).”

Questioning the survival strategy of the affected banks at declaring huge profit while yet not engaged in lending activities which is supposed to be the primary activity of a commercial bank, Adeyemo said: “I reliably gathered that some banks no longer lend money to their customers, this is a palpable sign of distress just as some do not lend beyond three months maturity period.  Now, with their stupendous overhead to defray on a monthly basis, how are they supposed to cope? Most banks have lost huge sums to the stock market while actively engaged in trading their shares. That was when most Nigerians wrongfully thought that the stock market was a ready treasure till.”  

In a review of how banking activities had impacted on the downturn in the capital market and had also thrown banking industry into worries of losses of huge sum, Adeyemo explained: “Over the past few months when the obvious slide in the stock market started, investors have lost not less than N3.5 trillion as a result of the depression in the market.  I understand that the loss came about from the maturity of the credit facilities which were taken by investors to buy FirstBank Plc public offer from other banks for which various collateral security such as share certificates, landed properties, etc; were deployed.  It must also be stated that FirstBank Plc returned over N600 billion of unallotted shares after holding the funds for over eight months at a paltry five per cent  per annum interest rate.  Meanwhile, the aggregate of charges which customers would have borrowed the returned funds from other banks cannot be less than 25 per cent  per annum.  The effect is that at the expiration of a credit facility, a demand is made on the investor to pay up or sell off the shares by the exposed bank thereby leading to a supply glut in the market as desperate investors simultaneously besiege the market looking for how to dispose various shares.  The net effect is a continuous loss of value on a daily basis.

“The investors who operate margin account with these banks are worse off since the exposed banks would have been mandated to dispose of the collaterised shares once the price drops to a threshold usually set at about 130 per cent of purchase price not minding the initial equity contribution made by the customer.

“It is a hidden truth that the hitherto astronomical rise in the price of the shares in the Nigeria Stock Exchange is as a result of price manipulations by banks.  These banks I understand give money to stockbrokers who they mandate to transact in the shares of the sponsoring banks thereby jerking up the price sequel to the bank entering into the market to source for fresh funds.  For example, a bank may give say N1 billion each to five stockbrokers to be trading in its shares.  These stockbrokers are given a target to meet within a specified period of time, say six months prior to a public offer.  The brokers then set out to buy and trade in the bank’s shares in the market in order to create an artificial scarcity thereof leading to a continuous upscale in market price.  After say six months, when the price would have risen to the desired height, the bank would then announce its entry into the market with fanfare whilst discounting the new offer price after the shares would have been put on technical suspension.  There and then, you will see gullible Nigerians rushing over themselves to buy these over-priced shares with huge funds secured from the banks.

“Now, with the loss of value of shares at the Nigerian Stock Exchange, banks have lost a lot of money but they are keeping quiet about it.  Also, the money which they lent to customers for the purpose of margin account has been wiped away having drastically dropped to a dismal level of say 20 per cent of initial purchase price.  In other words, these banks cannot even sell the collaterised shares as doing so will erode whatever security that they can rely upon since the share certificates have become worthless papers.  The banks too cannot bully the margin account customers to defray their debt whilst charging interest at an illegal default rate.  If the total loss of value in the stock exchange is N3.5 trillion, then the contribution of the banks alone cannot be less than N2 trillion being the most active players

“Is it not curious that at this point in time no bank can tell their percentage of risk exposure? This helps the banking public to know which banks are in good standing and which ones are not.”

Last week, after a period of assuring Nigerians that all was well with their banks, chief executives of banks decided to formally request the Federal Government to intervene in the nation’s financial sector to forestal the effect of the ongoing global financial crisis on the system.

Meeting under the aegis of the Committee of Banks’ Chief Executives, the bankers agreed to request the Federal Government to intervene in the nation’s financial market through a package of measures similar to those introduced in developed countries and that the Central Bank (CBN) should continue to support the interbank money market.

In response to the request for bail-out from government by the banks chief executives, Adeyemo observed: “I am not against bail-out of the banks that we have in Nigeria. My worries border on the unethical conducts of the banks that rather than focus on dispensing professional banking service would rather be engaged in all sorts of things like printing, security guards, stock-broking, estate developing, recharge card sale, telephone handset vending, etc; while neglecting its core functions of banking.  The bail-out will certainly salvage the economy while at the same time reinforce citizens’ confidence.  However, I am against allowing some of the present day fat-cat cocky executives from benefiting from their fraud and corrupt malpractices after ruining their so-called vast empires.

“I can tell you that things have become so bad that some ranking officials of some banks have started moving their own deposits away from their own  banks to some of the first generation banks. On the whole I see that just about six banks of the 24 operating banks would cross the healthy mark if a thorough examination of their books is conducted today. So, I need to warn Nigerian depositors to start conducting their own due diligence on their  banks.

“Depositors should start asking questions, they have to interact with other customers to know how the bank is attending to them. Do they have issues with facilities, are their issues with immediate payment of withdrawals and others.”

Adeyemo said in the light of saving depositors’ fund, he subscribes to a Federal Government initiated bail-out of the banks, but has his own suggestion on how it should be applied: “I subscribe to the Federal Government buying preference shares of maximum 30 per cent into the banks on a temporary basis of say a five-year period. The FG must not, however, attain majority shareholding in the banks.  This way, the board of the affected bank would be restructured with the Federal Government’s representatives on the board on a minority scale.  The Government may then sell off their investment as situation improves.”

Adeyemo noted with regrets that if the National Assembly had heeded his warnings when he petitioned it to probe banks, perhaps the present time reality would have been avoided: “It is a sorry case that the chicken is coming home to roost so shortly.  I candidly recall that it was in November 2007 that I forwarded two petitions to both the Senate and House of Representatives warning that with the present bad and precarious financial state of health of these banks, there was a need to institute a probe into their activities, otherwise the Federal Government may be required to bail them out in due course.  This petition led to the probe of the banking industry in May/June 2008 until the probe process was compromised.  I believe that if the probe had been conscientiously and painstakingly executed, maybe we would not find ourselves in this mess.”

AFTERMATH OF FALL-OUT WITH DANGOTE:FEMI OTEDOLA SEEKS ALLIANCE WITH JIMOH IBRAHIM

A re-alignment of business interests and affiliation is believed to be in the offing and it involves three of Nigeria’s most celebrated billionaires. In recent times, the news have made the rounds of a business skirmish between Alhaji Aliko Dangote and Mr. Femi Otedola, both had been known to be buddies and have been reported to have jointly engaged in business ventures over the last five years.

The chummy relationship between the two, however, is believed to have been embroiled in suspicion and a brickbat of sort on account of Dangote pitching his support for his kinsman, Sayyatu Dantata over the acquisition of the majority shareholding in downstream Chevron Nigeria Plc, a shareholding in which Otedola had confided his interest in Dangote.

Reports close to Otedola and Dangote indicated that on the heels of Dangote’s preference for Sayyatu, Otedola might have to go his way in matters of business relationship with Dangote, the officially profiled richest man in Nigeria.

But then, in the context of doing business in Nigeria where government influence is all pervading, a businessman must understand the act and intricacies of balancing power plays by networking with power players.

“Of course, you know that political power and influence determine a lot of things in business in Nigeria,” a source told FORTUNE & CLASS Weekly. “So to survive in business at the level these people operate, you have to know the right people and understand how to continue to pander to their needs. The relationship between Otedola and Dangote was principally predicated on this kind of facilitation. For instance, during the presidency of Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, the two had enjoyed some privileges of state support because Otedola enjoyed the favour of Obasanjo. Obasanjo extended his favour to Dangote because he was friend to Otedola, who is his Yoruba southwest kinsman. And since Nigeria’s democracy has a peculiar command structure, everybody within the circle of the Obasanjo’s presidency had to extend all the courtesies of power to the two businessmen,” the source explained.

With the shift of power to Northern Nigeria, our source reasoned that the centre of power influence revolves around a core group of Northerners and until the disagreement that unravelled the relationship between Dangote and Otedola, the two had farthered their business interests by acting together to relate with individuals that influence the power structure.

“With the parting of ways with Dangote, Femi must naturally form new alliances because he has grown quite massively in the business sector. And if I must tell you, the fact is that not many people are happy with big time players if they are not within the circle of the influential,” FORTUNE & CLASS source reasoned.

According to reports gathered last week, there are strong indications that Otedola, who owns Africa Petroleum, one of the country’s largest downstream sector operations and other long list of A-class business entities, might be gravitating towards Barrister Jimoh Ibrahim, the billionaire core investor in the nation’s biggest insurance concern, NICON Insurance.

“I understand that the two have started talking and I think it is natural. Barrister Ibrahim has survived a most violent onslaught by some adversaries in business and government. Do not forget that his business troubles started during the presidency of Obasanjo despite the fact that he, like Obasanjo, is from the Yoruba speaking southwest. This did not stop the presidency from contending with him on a number of issues that culminated in his sacking from NICON where he had invested so much. But as it turned out, he was able to resolve all the contentious issues and regain control of the company. And to top it all, he became quite friendly with the current president, Umar Musa Yar’Adua,” another source gushed.

“I think the two would find common ground to relate,” the source further asserted. “This is because the two of them are involved in the downstream sector of the oil and gas sector and are adventurous enough to pursue their business expansion dreams vigorously. I can say that very soon, the two of them would become a pair if the effort of elders facilitating the alliance is successful,” the source said.

EXPERT DECRIES BANK CHARGES ON RETURNED CHEQUES AS ILLEGAL

Mr. Ori Adeyemo, a forensic accountant and crusader for streamlined bank charges, has decried bank charges on returned cheques and described the fee deducted from accounts in consequence of returned cheques as illegal.

“It is trite that by virtue of Section 10, subsection of the defunct Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Bankers’ Tariff, a bank is allowed to charge N1,000 for a returned corporate cheque whilst debiting N300 for a returned individual cheque (to be borne by the drawer),” Adeyemo said.

“It is also true that by the provision of Section 11, subsection 6 of the subsisting CBN Guide To Bank Charges effective January 01, 2004, a returned cheque attracts 0.5 per cent of amount, maximum N5,000 (to be borne by the drawer).

“In both cases,” Adeyemo argued, “the CBN guidelines stipulate that only the drawer of a cheque should be penalised for a returned cheque and not the supposed beneficiary (who never took value for consideration anyway.)  Unfortunately, we all know that this situation is not true in Nigeria as banks whimsically charge both the drawer and drawee for a returned cheque, thereby amounting to double-jeopardy especially for the drawee who never took any benefit.”

 Affirming the contradiction in the statutes relating to fees sanctions as a result of returned chques, Adeyemo said: “I must emphasise that the CBN is wrong to have inserted returned cheque fee into the defunct Bankers’ Tariff as well as the subsisting CBN Guide To Bank Charges being in crass breach of the Dishonoured Cheque (Offences) Act of May 20, 1977, which makes it a nullity for the following reasons:

a.     That a returned cheque is a criminal offence and not a civil offence.

b.    That only the injured party (that is, the supposed beneficiary) has a right to complain about a returned cheque to the Nigeria Police or better still, the Economic & Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and definitely not a bank.

c.     Returned Cheque Fee is a penalty which only a court of competent jurisdiction can impose on a citizen of the country. 

d.    No party to a contract can impose any form of penalty/fine on other parties to a contract as doing so is repugnant to natural justice.  

e.     That a bank has no special or pecuniary interest in a returned cheque being just a clearing vehicle for a deposited cheque.

f.     That Section 9 of the subsisting CBN Guide to Bank Charges, clearing of cheque or draft in Nigeria is free.  Moreover, no bank can charge any fee for collecting any deposit in Nigeria.

g.    That according to the Dishonoured Cheque (Offences) Act of May 20, 1977, upon conviction; an individual is liable to two-year jail term without an option of fine while for a body corporate a penalty/fine of not less than N5,000.

h.     Only the Attorney-General of a state (without excluding the Attorney-General of the Federation) has a right of criminal prosecution of a defaulter and definitely not a bank.

i.      That Section 25 of the Interpretation Act (which provides that a person shall not be punished twice when guilty of an offence under more than one enactment) shall apply in respect of offences under this act.

j.      Since this Section 11.6 of the subsisting CBN Guide to Bank Charges as it relates to a bank charging its customer Returned Cheque Fee is in breach of the Dishonoured Cheques (Offences) Act being a legislation of the National Assembly, the Dishonoured Cheques (Offences) Act will prevail.

“In simple language, I am saying that since a bank is not a party to a returned cheque, then such bank cannot lay claim to it.  We should cast our mind to the law of privities of contract wherein it is clearly stated that only parties to a contract can sue for the enforcement of a contract and not even those in whose interest the contract was made,” Adeyemo insisted.

“You will agree with me that the initial beneficiary of a clearing cheque is the bank that went to clear the cheque that should have taken custody value for the drawee but that alone does not give room for the bank to lay any claim on the money since the bank is not the real beneficiary of the fund but just a mere custodian.

“Therefore, I cannot but submit that the present CBN Guide to Bank Charges, is fraught with illegalities to the crass detriment of bank customers thereby allowing banks to smile away at all times, leaving the customers short-changed.  In fact, this was one of the issues I had wanted to address in May 2008 at the House of Representatives’ probe of the banking industry until it was fraudulently compromised by the banking cabal working in concert with the then leadership of the House Committee on Banking & Currency.”

Adeyemo argued that on account of the subsisting convention of fee sanctioning for returned cheques, he had been demanding a review of the CBN Guide to Bank Charges: “I cannot but request for a thorough review of the CBN Guide to Bank Charges wherein the opinion of every stakeholder in the industry will be accommodated as against the present one which was drafted by Mr. Jim Ovia, the Zenith Bank Plc Managing Director and so wholesomely adopted by the CBN without any input from the bank customers, thereby skewing the graph in favour of the banking industry.

“In simple words, I submit that it is totally illegal for any Nigerian bank to penalize a customer for a returned cheque, as doing so will translate to the fact that the banks have become laws unto themselves, having illegitimately taken over the job of the judiciary,” Adeyemo submitted. 

ETB: SHAKE-UP IN ADENUGA’S BANK

Over the last six months, staffers of ETB, the bank owned by Dr. Mike Adenuga Jr. have had had to resume work with the burden of uncertainty weighing over their shoulders until close of work. Reason for the anxious moments at the workplace is the report of periodic letters being dispatched to personnel of the banks conveying management’s instructions advising the recipients of such letters to voluntarily retire from the services of the bank.

“Nobody is sure of what would happen during work hours,” a staff of the bank told FORTUNE & CLASS Weekly. “The fact is that we don’t know exactly what is going on; I am aware that the bank has been employing new people but at the same time is confounding that some of the people even, we staff consider to be very good at their work get these shocking letters of compulsion to disengage. So, how can one be at ease when one is at work with such things happening to co-workers and one has not made alternative employment arrangement?” the staff queried.

FORTUNE & CLASS Weekly gathered that a number of staff at the managerial level, have, however, taken their fate in their hands by resigning their appointments to avoid the unpleasantness of a sudden ditch by the bank’s management.

“I think those are that are lucky to quickly secure employment with other places are smart enough, if I have the option I will do the same. You can imagine people that had put between 10 and 16 years into the service being unceremoniously given the boots like that? Everybody would naturally be jittery,” another ETB’s staff echoed

“In fact, when one of the much respected senior officials at our branch got the letter informing him to voluntary retire, we were aghast. At first, we wanted to protest but unfortunately we did not have the right platform to do that. Then we told him that he should write in his retirement letter that he was forced to retire and explain in the letter that he had had a clean record of service delivery to the bank. When the concerned staff called his contact at head office of what he intended writing in his letter, the man at the other end said they won’t accept the letter if it is written that way. It’s really so frustrating,” another staff confided.

Mr. Abdul Funsho, Head Corporate Communications, however, insisted that nothing extraordinary was happening at the bank.

“The bank is only repositioning and restructuring for efficient service delivery. The bank is employing more hands by the day. So, it is natural that going forward the bank has to look for skills that match the vision and goals of the bank,” Funsho said.

LET THE MARKET BE!

 

Editor, Fortune&Class Magazine

What dominated my thoughts all through the slur of last week’s scandalous heehaw of denials of appointment of market makers for the Nigerian stock market and a supposed N600 billion bail-out, was to simply carry my face, literally speaking, away from official confusion brazenly hoisted on Nigerians by people in government.

That many Nigerian investors nurse a heavy heart in contemplation of the likely consequences of the gathering threat of implosion that may throw into the abyss, their hard earned money, invested, in the first instance, through massive urging by stock market operators and regulators, that had assured of the virility of the market, should be enough to make those in authority respond to issues bordering on matters relating to investment with a stronger sense of official responsibility.

 

When a number of respected daily newspapers published the story of the appointment of market makers and the N600billion bail-out, a buzz had generated in the investment community. Loud arguments on the impact or otherwise of the bail-out plan all that had commenced in earnest. But it was to last a mere 24 hours. Next morning, newspapers banner headlines announced that the Federal Government, the Securities and Exchange Commission plus the Central Bank of Nigeria had not even pondered the thought of a bail-out. It was an anti-climax, a cold water drenching anti-climax at that.

Yet, I reasoned that Nigerians deserve an explanation, an official explanation for the recklessness. Of course, this has nothing to do with the media houses that published the stories, as a journalist, I should know. The papers quoted sources at the Nigerian Stock Exchange, the story in fact, revolved around the conclusions of a marathon meeting of the Council of the Nigerian Stock Exchange.

It was not enough to simply make a rebuttal of the story, the appropriate authorities should have gone farther to inform the public of an intent at investigating the source of the rumour (as the news turned out) and of course, assure the pensive investing public of the seriousness attached to the investigation. At times like these, information has become sacred and the sanctity of it should not be eroded. In the first instance, it was the lack of credible information and perhaps, more troubling, the inclination for close circuiting that heckled the Nigerian stock market into the awkward state that it had degenerated.

Openness rules the market; it is at the heart of investors’ confidence, the deficiency of which has maligned the status of the market. It is sad that we won’t, in the character of institutional arrogance that had defaced relationships with the public, get to hear anything about the shenanigan that led to the breaking of that news. You can imagine what it would do to investors’ confidence to know the motive and goal of the people that held the meeting where resolutions concerning market makers and bail-out plan were made.

And to think that the Council of the Nigerian Stock Exchange was at the centre of these suggestions should be humbling. Though the SEC had announced it had nothing to do with it, yet, as the apex regulatory authority of the market, I guess the SEC should ask Prof. Ndi Okereke-Onyuike what her intentions were and why she did not get the input and approval of the appropriate authorities before sneaking the resolutions of her Council meeting to the public place.

More rubbish imagination of some funny, less thinking officials would still certainly assail us in these trying times. Policies would be made in the heat of anxiety without the corollary aggregation of the implementation procedure, it is the way of Nigerian aficionados, and the stock market is not insulated from this. The frustration of expecting so much from the policy-measures introduced by the egg-heads that gathered in Abuja these past August 26, is hurting enough. If I have my way, I ‘ll suggest that they just let this market be, and for the good Lord’s name sake, will somebody tell those big people that the one per cent limit on the fall of stock price is doing more harm to the market?

Let the market fall of its free will, it’s a reflection of the opinion of investors of the market and clearly attests to the value the market should be, as all things natural respond, when it gets to the nadir, it will generate an upward drive of its own volition.      

I personally can’t fathom the reason for the hysteria that seems to consume everyone about the present state of the market. We all saw it coming, but it suited everybody to chorus the great potential of the market when the run was going good. Turning a recalcitrant deaf ear to the admonition of concerned people that kept reminding us of the manipulations and many under-hand, under-table and a whole regime of under-something deals that were killing the market in instalments.

So, we have a burnt pot of porridge, just too bad, but then, even with the gathering storm of continued conjectures of global capital markets impacting on the Nigerian market, I still dare to insist that if the regulators can be more open in dissemination of information to the investing public, the worrisome situation of the market, can still stabilise. Nigeria and many other African countries are not in the range of the seismic undercurrent, that is at present, rocking the global market; but we can only be assured of our revival if those fiddlers and meddlers in the hierarchy of regulators, can be more discerning.

For the retail investors, many of whom, I understand, had taken flight to cash in hand or the bank, you’re doing something called market timing. It’s an implied statement that you’ve figured out the right moment to get out of stocks — and will also know the right time to get back in.

The truth of the situation is simple enough; the right time to move out of stocks was a year or so ago, before various stock indices the world over, fell by one-third or more.

If you missed that opportunity, you’re hardly alone.

But if you sell now, you’ll be locking in your losses. And once you’re in cash, there isn’t much upside. In fact, with interest rates low, you’re likely to lose money in cash, because inflation will probably eat up the after-tax returns you earn from a savings or money-market account.

A guarantee of a small loss may sound good right now. But if you’re not bailing out of stocks once and for all, how will you know when it’s time to get back in? The fact is, any peace of mind you gain by being on the sidelines now will turn into a migraine once you see how much you can harm your portfolio over time by missing just a bit of any rebound.

H. Nejat Seyhun, a professor of finance at the Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan, put together a study in 2005 for Towneley Capital Management, where he tested the long-term damage that investors could do to their portfolios if they missed out on the small percentage of days when the stock market experienced big gains.

From 1963 to 2004, the index of American stocks he tested gained 10.84 per cent annually in a geometric average, which avoided overstating the true performance. For people who missed the 90 biggest-gaining days in that period, however, the annual return fell to just 3.2 per cent. Less than one per cent of the trading days accounted for 96 per cent of the market gains.

This fall, Javier Estrada, a professor of finance at IESE Business School in Barcelona, published a similar study in The Journal of Investing that looked at equity markets in 15 nations, including the United States. A portfolio belonging to an investor who missed the 10 best days over several decades across all of those markets would end up, on average, with about half the balance of someone who sat tight throughout.

So moving to cash right now is just fine as long as you know precisely when to get back into stocks (even though you didn’t know when to get out of them).

At some point, stocks will indeed fall enough that investors will remove the money from their mattresses and put it to work, causing prices to rise significantly. But, as Bonnie A. Hughes, a certified financial planner with the Enrichment Group in Miami, put it, there won’t be an e-mail message or news release that goes out when this is about to happen. It will be evident only afterward, on the few days when the market surges.

WILL THE STOCK MARKET EVER RECOVER?

Many investors have sat and watched in bewilderment as the value of their stocks plummeted, a reason I have been asked over and over if the stock market will ever recover from the losses that have been accumulated over the past eight months. To be specific, investors have lost nothing less that three trillion naira in terms of paper losses alone. I said paper losses because the losses you see in your portfolio are not real until you give a sell order to your stock-broker, stocks are volatile assets whose value can change within a few trading days.

REASONS FOR THE PERSISITENT DECLINE

 1.   LOW INVESTOR CONFIDENCE: The bearish market which started in March has eroded the confidence of many investors, especially, those who entered into the stock market within the past two years. The peculiar thing about these new investors is the fact that a lot of them see the stock market as quick money making venture, and as you know, some of them have never witnessed such a long bearish period as we have witnessed within the past few months. It is also noteworthy that several investors had just begun to recover from the losses they sustained from wonder banks like Nospetco, Sefteg, etc; in 2007. I remember that such investors were condemned for being too greedy by stock analysts and they were admonished to limit their investment to stock market alone. So, at the beginning of 2008, we experienced a massive exodus of investors from the wonder banks to the stock market, but alas, the stock market has been crashing which have made such investors to resign from the investment world. This is no good news for all stakeholders in the market because all over the world, the confidence that investors have in a market determines how successful that market is since they are the ones who move the imaginary hand of demand and supply at all times.

 2.   POOR IMPLEMENTATION OF POLICIES: Our regulatory agencies should take one or two punches for the current situation of things because they have been slacked in their approach to recent developments in the market. A stakeholders meeting was finally called on the 26^th August to find solutions to the current situation after six months of a bearish market. Since then some of the policies that were identified have either not been implemented or simply relegated to the background. The most important of this is the creation of a stabilization fund to stem the bearish trend whenever necessary, I don’t know how you look at it, but from my point of view, I think this issue should have taken priority over other policies because without funds that are needed to buy stocks, the stock market can simply not move, it’s as simple as that.

Dear friends, gone are those days that fundamentals count and investors are motivated to buy shares because of good quarterly and audited results published by companies. Investors are not moved by results again and if you want to contradict this argument, check what has happened to the likes of Fidelity Bank, Oceanic Bank, etc; since they declared their fantastic results. The truth is, things are not normal and desperate situations require desperate actions. In addition to this, the authorities have not addressed the investing public since August 26. I have reasons to respect the American spirit better within these past few weeks that the Americans have been hit by an unprecedented financial crisis. Within two weeks, the president of the USA, the Senate president, speaker and federal reserve chairman have addressed the American public four good times trying all they can to update Americans on the situations of things and the way forward but it’s not like that here, investors are always left guessing.

Another controversial policy is the introduction of a minimum one per cent drop in prices while allowing stocks to gain a maximum five per cent in a day; this has caused what some investors call a slow motion in the stock market, a situation that has made the sale of stocks even more difficult than in the past, this was supposed to be a temporary measure but I think it’s here to stay. The list of the number of inefficiencies from our regulatory agencies cannot be exhausted in one piece of article, it is better left as it is.

3.   GLOBAL FINANCIAL CRISIS: the Nigerian crisis actually preceded the ongoing global financial crisis which started in the USA with the collapse of big banks like the Lehman Brothers, Merrill lynch and WAMU. Stock markets all over the world are currently taking the beating of their lives. As a matter of fact, the Russians had to shut down their stock exchange for two trading days in September in order to arrest excessive decline in stocks. Last Thursday afternoon, I saw some investors protesting in the legislative house in Hong Kong because of the losses they have made on their portfolio. Don’t mind the CIBN and CBN which recently came out to say that we are immune to the global financial crisis; the truth is that we are not immune and I will state my reasons.

First, recall that we had touted the entry of foreign institutional investors who were planning to come into the Nigerian market as one of the factors that will lead to a bullish market in 2008, but at present, the JP Morgan, Merryl Lynch, or Barclays of these world won’t come into the Nigerian market for now because they have serious problems to contend with back at home. In fact, Charles Soludo, Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria recently shifted the blame for the recent market drop to some of these foreign investors who have pulled their funds out of the Nigerian stock market.

Despite all these challenges, it is not all gloomy for the Nigerian market because there is always light at the end of the tunnel, this market will definitely recover soon and the road to recovery will form the central theme of my article in the next edition. Watch out for it.