NSE Slams N46m Fine on African Alliance, Shareholders React

By Dipo Olowookere No fewer than 15 Nigerian Small and Medium-sized Businesses (SMBs) will share the N75 million set aside by a tech giant, Google, in the 2023 edition of Hustle Academy Fund. The initiative was introduced in 2022 to provide equity-free funds to small business owners to scale up their operations and support entrepreneurial growth in Nigeria. Entries for the exercise opened on Thursday, September 28 and will close on Thursday, October 12, 2023, and to be eligible, businesses must be Nigerian-founded, operating within Nigeria for 1-5 years, and have a clear and scalable business plan. They should have

By Dipo Olowookere The board of Capital Hotels Plc has announced the creation of an escrow account for the payment of about N1.6 billion to minority shareholders of the company. The hospitality firm is leaving the Nigerian Exchange (NGX) Limited after years on the nation’s main stock exchange. In a notice signed by Alex Ugwuanyi, the organisation said the account was created with CardinalStone Registrars Limited and has been sufficiently funded for payment “to shareholders” who “have accepted to exit” the firm by selling their holdings. Recall that in March 2023, shareholders of Capital Hotels approved the request of the

By Bliss Okperan A lady who reviewed a product of Erisco Foods Limited, Nagiko Tomato Mix, Mrs Chioma Egodi, has threatened to demand the sum of N500 million from the chief executive of the company, Mr Eric Umeofia, for violating her fundamental human rights. Mrs Egodi said she purchased the product at the market with the intention of using it to cook stew for her family. However, when she tasted it, according to her, it tasted too much sugar, prompting her to post about it on Facebook. It was reported that Erisco was not happy with the negative review. She

By Adedapo Adesanya The Naira appreciated against the US Dollar in the Investors and Exporters (I&E), the Peer-to-Peer (P2P), and the black market arms of the foreign exchange (forex) market on Friday, September 29, as a turbulent third quarter ended. In the official segment, the local currency improved its value against the greenback by 2.6 per cent or N20.04 to close at N755.27/$1, in contrast to the preceding day’s N775.31/$1 amid a drop in the supply of FX into the system by 11.6 per cent or $16.73 million to $127.82 million from the $144.55 million published on Thursday. In the

New-age financial solutions powerhouse, Zedcrest Group, marked the International Women’s Day by organizing a career and mentoring programme for its female staff and customers at its Marina Office on Tuesday, March 9, 2020. Speaking on the theme of this year’s IWD event #EachforEqual, Group Managing Director of Zedcrest, Mr Adedayo Amzat, urged women to continuously strive for excellence, underscoring that true empowerment of people comes through achieving excellence. He stated that the career and mentoring programme organized by the company was not just to advocate for gender equality but to also empower all female staff of the company. The GMD,

By Adedapo Adesanya The Nigerian Stock Exchange hosted its first-ever Digital Closing Gong ceremony on Thursday, April 16, 2020, in honour of the contributions of Sterling Bank Plc to the fight against COVID-19 in Nigeria. The closing gong, which is traditionally done on the floor of the exchange, was carried out via Instagram Live due to the temporary closure of the trading floor as a result of the current global situation. The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the NSE, Mr Oscar Onyema, speaking on the innovativeness of recreating the famed closing ceremony, stated that, “It has been our pleasure to

Relief may have come the way of parents, guardian, teachers and proprietors of schools in Nigeria as Sterling Bank Plc launches it’s the Back-To-School Campaign. The campaign is aimed at providing succour for all stakeholders in the sector as schools resume in September. The primary target for the campaign are the primary and secondary schools (administrators, owners and teachers) while the secondary audience are all primary and secondary school-students and their parents. Areas covered under the campaign include School financing, Asset Finance, Textbook and Educational Materials Finance for schools; School fees finance for parents; Coding and Robotics Summer Boot Camp

By Dipo Olowookere Two sets of alternative financing agreements on Joint Venture (JV) projects to boost reserves and production in line with government’s aspiration were executed in London on Monday between the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) and two of its JV partners: NNPC/Chevron Nigeria Limited (CNL) JV and NNPC/Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) JV. The two projects are expected to generate incremental revenues of about $16 billion within the assets’ life cycle including a flurry of exploratory activities that would generate employment opportunities in the industry, boost gas supply to power and rejuvenate Nigeria’s industrial capacity utilization. The agreement

By Modupe Gbadeyanka On May 1, 2017, High Street Real Estate Fund V, L.P. held its final close, reaching its hard cap with total equity commitments of $353 million. Utilizing targeted leverage of 50 percent, the Fund will seek to acquire approximately $700 million of assets in its target markets. High Street Realty Company, formed the Fund to continue its successful strategy of acquiring smaller warehouse distribution assets in the eastern two-thirds of the United States, with a specific focus on Class A and B infill properties fulfilling regional and “last mile” logistics requirements for its tenants. The Fund targets

By Adedapo Adesanya  The Brent crude extended gains on Thursday to record its sixth consecutive rally at the global oil market, closing last night at its highest level in three months so far since mid-September, when the attack on Saudi Arabia Aramco oil fields drove oil prices up. The price of the category of crude oil increased by 36 cents or 0.55 percent a day after data showed a weekly decline in U.S. crude inventories to trade at $65.59 per barrel. Also, the US West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude was up by 29 cents or 0.48 percent to settle at

By Dipo Olowookere Monday, October 14, 2019 has been fixed for a court-ordered meeting for shareholders of Dangote Flour Mills Plc to approve the sale of the firm to Olam International Limited through its subsidiary, Crown Flour Mills Limited. Olam is looking to pay N120 billion for the acquisition of the company’s five billion shares not held by Crown Flour Mills at the rate of N24 each. A statement released by Dangote Flour Mills disclosed that the “meeting will be held at 10:00am on Monday, October 14, 2019 at Muson Centre, Onikan, Lagos Island, Lagos.” It was stated that registration

By Adedapo Adesanya The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) has said that the number of Electricity Distribution Companies (DisCos) customers in Nigeria increased by 1.4 per cent from 10.37 million in 2020 to 10.51 million in 2021. The report, Nigeria Electricity Report 2021, focuses on energy billed, revenue generated, and customers by DISCOS under the reviewed period. The report said the number of metered customers rose by 36.2 per cent from 3.51 million in 2020 to 4.77 million in 2021, causing the number of estimated billing customers to decrease by 16.3 per cent from 6.86 million in 2020 to 5.74