Economy

NSIA Posts 18.5% Shortfall in Income

Published

5 years ago

04/07/2020

By Adedapo Adesanya

The Nigeria Sovereign Investment Authority (NSIA) has disclosed that its total comprehensive income for 2019 dropped 18.5 percent to N36.2 billion from N44.3 billion recorded in 2018.

The Managing Director of the authority, Mr Uche Orji, made the disclosure at a virtual meeting held to announce the performance of the establishment on Friday.

According to Mr Orji, despite the drop in income, the real performance on core activities of the agency indicated that it had a better performance compared to the preceding year, increasing by 35 percent when currency revaluation income earned in 2018 is excluded.

According to him, the performance reflects the strength and capability of portfolio and risk management within the institution, especially when considering the volatile global and generally challenging local investment environment.

He said: “Interest income, a key component of total income, earned in 2019 was N27.02 billion, representing a 13 percent increase over the N23.82 billion recorded in 2018.

“This underscores NSIA’s strategy to generate fixed income returns from securities that generate predictable interest, and steady returns including Eurobonds, Treasury bills and other secured deposits.

“2019 was a mostly favourable year for the authority in terms of performance. We deployed our diversified asset strategy and secured positive returns from the international markets across all asset class.

“All asset classes, including equities, hedge funds and private equity outperformed. In the period, we also judiciously deployed capital toward key infrastructure project and recorded significant progress.

“Markets experienced a strong bullish run in 2019 due to the accommodative interest rate environment, sheathing of swords by US and China in the trade war and the signing of the Brexit agreement.

“On this account, the markets experienced fewer bouts of volatility. The Authority’s fund performed favorably by generating aggregate returns of 6.43 percent”.

“We evolved some framework and policies to enhance the internal operations of the NSIA. Our goal was to better position the institution to take advantage of growth opportunities in the market.

“To enshrine this across all NSIA touchpoints, we also replicated these systems in the subsidiary governance and management structures”, he added.

In her remarks, the Chief Operating Officer of NSIA, Mrs Stella Ojekwe-Onyejeli said the authority recorded a 5 percent growth in total assets in the sum of N32.2 billion; bringing the total assets in the books to N649.8 billion as of year-end. The total assets in 2018 closed at N617.7 billion.

“The authority continues to manage 3rd party funds on behalf of some government institutions. We currently manage funds for the Debt Management Office (DMO) and the Ministry of Finance.

“For DMO, the Current value of Asset under Management (AuM) is $124.03 million. For 2018, this fund stood at $122.60 million in AuM.

“For the Nigeria Stabilization Fund, managed on behalf of the Ministry of Finance, the fund balance was N33.365 billion. As of year-end 2018, this balance was N20.814 billion.

“As of year-end 2019, NSIA’s core capital remained at $1.5 billion. However, the National Economic Council voted for an additional capital contribution of US$250 million in 2019 which was received on April 8, 2020”, she explained.

Economy

NASD OTC Bourse Declines Further by 0.16%

Published

2 hours ago

22/01/2025

Adedapo Adesanya

By Adedapo Adesanya

The NASD Over-the-Counter (OTC) Securities Exchange recorded a 0.16 per cent decline on Tuesday, January 21, extending its loss this week to two.

This further depleted the market capitalisation of the alternative stock exchange by N1.65 billion at the close of transactions to N1.071 trillion from the N1.073 trillion it closed in the preceding session.

In the same vein, the NASD Unlisted Security Index (NSI) slid by 4.79 points to wrap the session at 3,100.33 points compared with 3,105.12 points recorded in the previous session.

The bourse ended with two price losers yesterday led by Geo Fluids Plc, which gave up 32 Kobo to trade at N4.38 per share versus Monday’s closing price of N4.70 per share and FrieslandCampina Wamco Nigeria Plc, which depreciated by 15 Kobo to close at N39.50 per unit compared with the previous day’s N39.65 per unit.

On the second trading day of the week, the number of deal carried out slightly went up by 8.3 per cent to 13 deals from the 12 deals executed at the previous trading session.

Also, the value of transactions increased by 97.2 per cent to N4.5 million from the N2.5 million recorded a day earlier, while the volume of securities traded in the session declined by 71.6 per cent to 183,780 units from the 767,610 units recorded on Monday.

FrieslandCampina Wamco Nigeria Plc remained the most traded equity by value (year-to-date) with 4.1 million units worth N162.9 million, followed by Geo-Fluids Plc with 9.1 million units valued at N44.0 million, and 11 Plc with 55,358 sold for N14.5 million.

Also, Industrial and General Insurance (IGI) Plc closed the day as the most active stock by volume (year-to-date) with 25.3 million units worth N5.9 million, trailed by Geo-Fluids Plc with 9.1 million units sold for N44.0 million, and FrieslandCampina Wamco Nigeria Plc with 4.1 million units valued at N162.9 million.

Economy

Naira Crashes to N1,552/$1 at NAFEM, N1,670/$1 at Black Market

Published

3 hours ago

22/01/2025

Adedapo Adesanya

By Adedapo Adesanya

Pressure further mounted on the Nigerian Naira in the different segments of the foreign exchange market on Tuesday, making its value to shrink against the United States Dollar at the close of business.

In the Nigerian Autonomous Foreign Exchange Market (NAFEM), the domestic currency crashed against its American counterpart during the session by 0.18 per cent or N2.73 to settle at N1,552.78/$1, in contrast to Monday’s closing price of N1,550.05/1.

But against the Pound Sterling and the Euro, the local currency traded flat in the official market yesterday at N1,906.98/£1 and N1,613.48/€1, respectively.

As for the black market segment, the Naira weakened against the Dollar on Tuesday by N5 to sell for N1,670/$1 compared with the preceding day’s value of N1,665/$1.

Meanwhile, the cryptocurrency market heaved a sigh of relief during the session as President Donald Trump created a crypto task force dedicated to “developing a comprehensive and clear regulatory framework for crypto assets.”

The task force will be led by Commissioner Hester Peirce, a long-time advocate for the crypto industry, and will work closely with the crypto industry to develop regulations. This is after Mr Gary Gensler, an opponent of crypto, officially stepped down as chairman of the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) after Mr Trump’s term started.

The task force will also work with Congress, providing “technical assistance” as it crafts crypto regulations.

Solana (SOL) recorded a 9.2 per cent growth to sell at $257.09, Dogecoin (DOGE) rose by 7.6 per cent to $0.36789, Ripple (XRP) added 4.0 per cent to finish at $3.18, and Bitcoin (BTC) increased by 3.7 per cent to $105,515.03.

Further, Binance Coin (BNB) appreciated by 2.8 per cent to close at $699.01, Cardano jumped by 2.1 per cent to trade at $0.9972, Ethereum (ETH) soared by 2.0 per cent to settle at $3,308.21, and Litecoin (LTC) went up by 1.5 per cent to end at $116.72, while the US Dollar Tether (USDT) and the US Dollar Coin (USDC) closed flat at $1.00 each.

Economy

Brent Falls Below $80 as US Signals Boost to Oil Output

Published

4 hours ago

22/01/2025

Adedapo Adesanya

By Adedapo Adesanya

The price of the Brent crude oil grade went below the $80 mark on Tuesday after it shed 86 cents or 1.1 per cent to trade at $79.29 per barrel after the US President, Mr Donald Trump, signaled the possibility of his country boosting its oil production.

This move raised concerns of higher US output in a market widely expected to be oversupplied this year, with the US West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures falling by $1.99 or 2.6 per cent during the session to $75.89 per barrel.

On his first day in office, the US President signed an executive order to unleash America’s energy by easing the barriers to oil and gas extraction and production and revoking a series of climate orders by former President Joe Biden.

As pledged in the campaign, the executive order follows the declaration of a national energy emergency.

The declaration includes measures to expedite energy infrastructure delivery, and emergency approvals by agencies “to facilitate the identification, leasing, siting, production, transportation, refining, and generation of domestic energy resources, including, but not limited to, on Federal lands.”

This will likely confirm expectations that the oil market will be oversupplied this year after weak economic activity and energy transition efforts weighed heavily on demand in top-consuming nations the US and China.

President Trump also said he was considering imposing 25 per cent tariffs on imports from Canada and Mexico from February 1, rather than on his first day in office as promised.

The delay helped ease concerns of an immediate tightening of the market among US refiners, many of which are geared to process the type of crude oil supplied by these countries.

The US Energy Information Administration (EIA) reiterated on Tuesday its expectations for oil prices to decline both this year and next.

On its part, the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) projects robust demand growth in the world both this year and next.

In 2025, OPEC says demand is set to grow by 1.4 million barrels per day leaving its projection unchanged from the December report.

However, losses were also limited after the US president said his administration would “probably” stop buying oil from Venezuela. The U.S. is the second-biggest buyer of Venezuelan oil after China.

Also weighing on prices on Tuesday was the potential end to the shipping disruption in the Red Sea.

Yemen’s Houthis said on Monday they will limit their attacks on commercial vessels to Israel-linked ships provided the Gaza ceasefire is fully implemented.