By Ikponmwosa Amadasun
Modern technological advancements continue to cause disruptions in our world, impacting nearly all areas of endeavour as we discover diverse use cases. Just like every other aspect of life, the role of technology in investing cannot be over-emphasized.
Within the financial services industry, derivative innovation has led to an explosion of online or digital offerings. We now have the tools to optimize service efficiency, minimize costs, enable faster transactions, and real-time access monitoring and security features. This improved capacity has ensured a greater competitive advantage by serving as a foundation for smarter investment decisions.
The adoption of smart technologies has continued to simplify processes whilst also helping wealth managers take better-calculated investment risks. Gone are the days when capital market participants were subjected to hectic and time-consuming processes to consummate transactions due to the presence of intermediaries.
With decreasing intermediation, there has also been a significant decline in issues associated with manual records, audits, and verification. Furthermore, reporting is now much more streamlined, given the increasing sophistication of analytics tools that allow for faster and better-protected decision-making.
For CardinalStone Securities, especially in these times of greater economic volatility, the consistent use of best-in-class technologies powers the financial decisions it makes on behalf of clients.
Elile Olutimayin, Managing Director at the firm, holds a strong belief in this progressive approach: “The parade of new technologies and scientific breakthroughs is relentless and is unfolding on many fronts. We are not ignorant of these advancements, and we constantly upskill ourselves with the requisite knowledge to adapt to changing realities.
At CardinalStone, we continue to leverage smart platforms like Bloomberg Intelligence and the NGX X-Gen Software to execute clients’ trades.
Especially at a time of economic uncertainties when investors’ priority is to both build and protect their wealth, these technologies have to be reliable; providing us with a tick-by-tick live feed throughout the trading day, needed to make great investment decisions for all our clients spread across the world.”
Beyond the varied benefits to corporates, technology is also helping individuals become smarter investors. With increasing digital penetration rates, web apps have transformed the retail trading experience and vastly reduced the need for intermediaries.
In recognition of this trend, CardinalStone recently upgraded its web application and portal, an all-purpose digital investment and trading platform that empowers clients with the real-time capability to access and manage held investments across all our business subsidiaries. The platform is expected to enhance positioning and improve decision-making as we navigate through these unprecedented times in the global economy.
Perhaps CardinalStone’s evident affinity for technology is one of the drivers of its record-setting achievements, which is solely executing the Union Bank acquisition, the largest transaction ever in the history of the Nigerian Stock Exchange. Undoubtedly, the capital market has become more agile, with CardinalStone setting the pace.
Ikponmwosa Amadasun is an Associate, Securities Trading at CardinalStone Securities
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