The Securities and Exchange Commission has expressed concern about the rising number of unclaimed dividends in the capital market.
The Chairman, SEC, Mallam Suleiman Ndanusa, spoke on the position of the commission on Thursday at the Capital Market Committee retreat in Abuja.
Ndanusa, who said unclaimed dividends currently stood at over N60bn, urged the CMC to proffer a solution to the problem.
He said, “One of the challenges that we still have today, which I am going to leave for the CMC (to solve) is the issue of unclaimed dividends.
“The CMC, under the leadership of SEC, attempted to address the issue of unclaimed dividends, which was about N8bn some years ago, but, today, the figure has grown to between N40 and N60bn.”
The CMC retreat is an annual event conceived by SEC as a platform to create awareness about the benefits of the capital market and serve as a platform for the capital market community to review developments in the market and find ways to overcome the challenges of the market.
In her remarks at the retreat, the Director-General, SEC, Ms Arunma Oteh, explained that the CMC had made an impact based on its goals.
Oteh, who said the commission was happy with the level of awareness Nigerians had about the capital market, stressed that the roles the market could play were numerous.
She said, “We are very pleased with the awareness among Nigerians of the critical role the capital market can play in actualising Nigeria’s economic potential by supplying the much needed medium-to-long term capital for government’s infrastructure development and business expansion.
“However, capital markets do far more than provide access to capital. They are enablers of socio-economic development because they sustain macro-economic stability, hasten the rate of capital formation, foster meritocracy and promote good corporate governance, innovation and entrepreneurship.”
In line with the theme of the event, ‘Actualising Nigeria’s economic potential through a world class capital market,’ Oteh explained that efforts were being made to strengthen SEC and raise it to a world-class capital market regulator in order to build a strong market.
Stressing that Nigeria has the potential to become one of the important drivers of global growth and development, Oteh said, “We are here because we believe the capital market is very critical to the actualisation of that promise.”
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