The Director General of the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Nigeria, Mr. Lamido Yuguda, has said that for any country to be among the most economically advanced globally, the government must prioritize the development of its capital market.
The Director General made this remark at the First Nigeria Employers Summit organized by the Nigeria Employers Consultative Association in Abuja.
He explained that to achieve the sustainable growth of the capital market and its stability, the market mechanisms must be complemented with regulatory frameworks.
According to him, in furtherance of its statutory mandate the SEC has over the years been introducing important regulations to the nation’s capital market to reduce operational impediments and engender the smooth functioning of the market.
Yuguda expatiated: “As the apex regulator of the Nigerian capital market, the SEC has executed several initiatives to build a collaborative regulatory environment for enterprise competitiveness, job creation and national development.
“Through its ten-year Capital Market Master Plan (2015-2025), which serves as the primary roadmap for the development of the Nigerian capital market, the Commission has mapped out strategies to build a capital market that is the largest on the continent of Africa and one of the world’s deepest by 2025.
“The Master Plan’s implementation has been admitted as the 246th programme and project in the recently approved National Development Plan 2021-2025 (NDP2515033).
“The Commission continues to enhance its regulatory framework through the issuance of Rules to keep pace with market trends. Recent ones include rules on Investment-based crowdfunding, which created an enabling environment for capital raising by start-ups and on Annual Renewal of Registration of Capital Market Operators to ensure only fit and proper persons operate in the Nigerian capital market”, the DG added.
Yuguda said the SEC had been committed to the fulfillment of its mandate of protecting investors, creating an enabling environment for market operations and remained consistent in its mandate of ensuring that the market provides an important channel of financing for the real sector to drive economic growth; allocate risk appropriately; support financial stability and smoothen transmission of monetary policy.
He listed some of the major benefits of a well-regulated and developed capital market as including macroeconomic development, lower transaction cost, greater liquidity, improved productivity, infrastructure development and facilitation of a housing finance revolution.
Others are, facilitation of improved allocation of capital and provide small, medium and large companies access to the market to raise funds; improved foreign inflows of capital; productivity growth lower unemployment, and improved living standards.
