NSE: History of the Nigerian Stock Exchange

In this article we are going to take a look at the history of Nigerian stock exchange from 1960 up till this moment. The Lagos stock exchange was established on 15th September, 1960. The Lagos stock exchange was the progenitor of the NSE.

The Lagos stock exchange started its official operation on the 25th day of August in the year 1961. The LSE started with nineteen security listed. Before the official commencement, the LSE had started an informal operation in June.

The stock exchange had four arms at that time and their operations were carried out in the central Bank building in Lagos Island.

The volume of trade in August, 1961 was around £80, 500 and it increased later to £250,000. At that time, majority of the investment were in government securities.

The Lagos stock exchange was renamed as Nigerian Stock Exchange in December 1977 with branches in major cities in the country. There are 13 branches of NSE located at various states in Nigeria. The states are Bauchi, Abeokuta, Owerri, Ilorin, Benin, Uyo, Port Harcourt, Kano, Onisha, Ibadan, Abuja, Abeokuta and Kaduna.

In 1999, the Nigeria Stock exchange commenced the use of the Automated Trading System (ATS) which allows dealers to get connected through Network of computers that are connected to a server.

The Nigerian Stock Exchange commence trading by 9.30am every business day and closes by 2.30pm.

The Nigeria Capital Market was deregulated in the year 1993. This enables the issuing houses and stockbrokers to determine the prices of new issues while the stockbroker alone determines the secondary market prices.

Consequently, the market prices, the All-share index, as well as the sector indices and NSE 30 are published on daily basis in Newspapers, The Nigeria Stock Exchange CAPNET and the stock exchange daily list.

The Nigerian Stock Exchange is a member of FIBV which is world federation of exchanges. The exchange is a foundation member of ASEA, Africa Stock Exchange Association.

In 2013, the Nigerian Stock Exchange became a member of United Nation’s sustainable Stock Exchanges and the NSE suspended 17 companies for their inability to follow the regulatory provisions of the law as regards corporate governance.

The list of the suspended companies is listed below:

  • African Alliance Insurance Plc
  • Equity Assurance Plc
  • Fortis Microfinance Bank Plc
  • Guinea Insurance Plc
  • Premier Paints Plc
  • Resort Savings & Loans
  • Sovereign Trust Insurance Plc
  • African Paints (Nigeria) Plc
  • Aso Savings & Loans Plc
  • Ekocorp Plc
  • Evans Medical Plc
  • Goldlink Insurance Plc
  • Great Nigeria Insurance Plc
  • Omatek Ventures Plc
  • Union Dicon Salt Plc
  • Union Homes Savings & Loans Plc
  • Universal Insurance Company Plc

The suspension of these companies includes payment of fines as directed by the NSE. The suspension will be lifted after the payment.

The transaction of NSE was reviewed in April 2018 and it was discovered to have close on a downward note as at 25th day of April, 2018.

Twenty three stocks depreciated at the close of trading on 25th of April, 2018. TOTAL emerged as the highest price loser of the day. Dangote comes next with the N3 to close at N245 per share. Some of the losers are FBN Holdings, shedding N1.20 to close at N12.20 per share. WAPCO declined by 85kobo to close  at N42.40 per share while Oando depreciated by 45kobo to close at N8.70 per share.

The top gainer is Nestle with N74.60 to close at N1568.20 per share. Other gainers are Seplat, Presco, Forte Oil, and GlaxoSmithKline.

As at 25th of April, the investors exchanged 350 million shares in about 5,020 deals and it can be valued at N4.6billion.