Tight Supplies, Weak Greenback Buoy Oil Prices

By Aduragbemi Omiyale The Vice President, Mr Kashim Shettima, has said Nigeria is in dire need of foreign direct investment (FDI) more than ever before, tasking domestic and foreign investors to make Nigeria their investment hub because efforts are being made to formulate business-friendly policies. Mr Shettima, while speaking when he hosted the management of First Surat Group, as well as top management of MTN Nigeria at the presidential villa in Abuja, charged MTN Nigeria to facilitate and spearhead digital mobile money and digital education. He assured that President Bola Tinubu was willing to partner with various stakeholders in the

By Dipo Olowookere Profit-taking persisted on the floor of the Nigerian Exchange (NGX) Limited, as investors refused to tone down their profit-taking activities. It was observed that the market is gradually entering panic mode due to macroeconomic instability in the country, especially with the exchange rate of the Naira to the Dollar going above N1,000 in the parallel market. A stockbroker with one of the leading brokerage firms in the country, who asked not to be named, said the local bourse was witnessing panic selling due to investors liquidating their shares for Dollars. “This trend will continue for a while

By Adedapo Adesanya  The Petroleum and Natural Gas Senior Staff Association of Nigeria (PENGASSAN) has vowed to down tools and shut down all oil field locations if demands following the acquisition of Nigerian Agip Oil Company (NAOC) are not met. Business Post had reported in September that Oando Plc had acquired a 100 per cent stake in the Nigerian subsidiary of Italian giant, Eni. However, the deal allegedly happened without management addressing the welfare and benefits of the workers and without due process. The development has led to several protests by members of PENGASSAN since the beginning of September 2023.

By Adedapo Adesanya The value of the NASD Over-the-Counter (OTC) Securities Exchange sharply declined by 3.86 per cent on Thursday, September 28, after the shares of VFD Group Plc were taken out of the platform. VFD Group, according to reports, is planning to trade its stocks on a larger platform, the Nigerian Exchange Limited (NGX). The delisting of the company’s equities brought down the market capitalisation of the NASD OTC exchange by N44 billion to settle at N1.102 trillion compared with the N1.146 trillion it finished on Tuesday, the last trading session. The market was closed on Wednesday as a

By Aduragbemi Omiyale The board of Ecobank Group has proposed the payment of $28 million to its shareholders for the 2022 fiscal year amid a 13 per cent improvement in profit before tax to $540 million. In the financial statements of the company released over the weekend, the lender attributed the growth in the pre-tax profit to the results of its “diversified business model.” According to the bank, in the year under review, its commercial banking business posted solid profit growth of 100 per cent to $134 million, with the consumer banking segment growing by 50 per cent to $130

By Modupe Gbadeyanka The United Nations (UN) has condemned the “unauthorized search” of its base for humanitarian workers in Maiduguri, Borno State by the Nigerian Army last week. In a statement issued by the global body, it said the military’s action could be “detrimental to the critical work” being carried out every day to support the most vulnerable in the north-east region of Nigeria caused by Boko Haram crisis. The Humanitarian Coordinator for Nigeria, Mr Edward Kallon, has said the UN does not have any information at this time regarding the reason or motivations for the unauthorized search. However, Mr

By Dipo Olowookere A resurgence in economic confidence was experienced by credit professionals in the final quarter of 2016, according to the UK’s latest Credit Managers’ Index (CMI). Yet bad debt remains a risk with only 13% of credit managers expecting a decline in 2017. Full results from the quarterly barometer of the Chartered Institute of Credit Management (CICM) have now been released; the CMI’s headline Index closed up 0.5 points to 59.8, ending a successive three-quarter fall. It is the highest result since Q2 2015 and only the fifth time in the CMI’s seven-year history it has climbed above

By Dipo Olowookere Mid-level Nigerian lender, Unity Bank Plc, sustained its upward movement in the first half of 2022 after surviving some turbulent moments. Details of the financial statements of the bank for the period ended June 30, 2022, showed that there were significant improvements across key performance indicators as the lender’s robust digital channels, arising from sustained investment in its digital payment infrastructure, resulted in improved earnings. The gross earnings for the period under review expanded by 17 per cent year-on-year to N27.6 billion, with interest and similar income rising by 18 per cent to N23.938 billion from N20.273

**Legal Expert Says Bank Can Take Action Against Peddlers The Bank Customers Association of Nigeria (BCAN) late Sunday detested in unequivocal terms the attempt by some social media commentators and publishers to disparage the image of the First City Monument Bank (FCMB) in the face of the ongoing controversies over alleged extra-marital affairs of the bank’s Managing Director, Mr Adam Nuru, describing the act of the commentators as unjustifiable. The National President of the umbrella body of bank customers in Nigeria, Dr Uju Ogubunka, in a chat with BRTNews.ng, condemned the ongoing efforts of some agents on social media platforms

By Ahmed Rahma As a result of the shortage of Dollar in Nigeria, which is putting pressure on the Naira, foreign portfolio investors have devised another strategy to pull their funds out of the country through the capital market. According to a report by Bloomberg, this new means is by buying gold Exchange-Traded Funds (ETF) and to trade in South Africa, Nigeria’s main economic rival on the African continent. The ETFs have been extolled for everything, from democratizing asset investment to making better market liquidity, but that this, savvy investors in Africa have hit on a less obvious benefit, the

By Modupe Gbadeyanka The Abia State government says it will integrate all farmers who are interested into the Anchor Borrowers Programme (ABP) of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN). Special Adviser to the Abia State Governor on Agriculture, Mr Israel Amanze, stated this in an interview with Radio Nigeria. Mr Amanze further stated that the government would also empower the farmers with various incentives like fertiliser, funds, tractors as well as buying all farm produce to ease the stress of farmers looking for buyers for their products. According to him, data collection of farmers was still on-going. From the registration,

By Dipo Olowookere The volume of trades on the floor of the Nigerian Exchange (NGX) Limited recorded a significant increase on Tuesday on renewed bargain-hunting. Business Post reports that investors were interested in domestic stocks during the session as they cherry-picked equities trading at relatively cheap prices. Shares of companies on Customs Street, Lagos, have been trading at low prices in the past months amid fears of uncertainties in the country, especially as Nigeria prepares for the 2023 general elections in February. But today, the trading volume rose by 204.59 per cent as investors exchanged 420.3 million shares worth N3.6