Nigerian Stock Market – The Impact of Information Technology

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The Nigerian capital market was not popular during military rule; that was the time when very few wealthy people took advantage of benefits of the stock market. Majority of Nigerians were unaware of Nigerian stock market. With the advent of democracy radical changes were brought about in the field of telecommunications and subsequently restructuring of stock exchange operations was carried out.

The big change brought was live trading on computers and crediting the transactions into investors’ account within four days. This revolutionary change brought transparency into the sector. More and more Nigerians at home and abroad got involved in Nigerian Stock Market activities. Also the use of information technology in helped to curb fraudulent schemes from issuing houses.

Central Securities Clearing System was introduced this monitors the stock exchange activities in a computer based environment showing all transactions and hence providing to all investors a fair trading system. With the launch of Automatic Trading System the automation of NSM was done. Subsequently e-bonus, e-allotment, e-dividend and e-IPO were introduced and implemented. The GSM operators were of great effect in increasing the credentials of this sector. In 2006, phone based alert program was introduced which increased the trust of investors in Nigerian stock Exchange commission.

The impact of Information Technology would be incomplete if the mention of internet effect is not done. The internet has added to the transparency and means of investing in the stocks as one can use online facility to be part of day to day transaction in stock trading. Additionally one can have the complete information about share index, volume and value of stock traded.

With so much of information technology getting into trading and information about the Nigerian stock market, every investor should have awareness about how to use it for the maximum benefits in terms of getting the most out of it. This is just an information to intending investors to know how best to maximize their potentials in the Nigeria stock market.

However,the impact of technological advancement has in no small means contributed to the development of this unit of the economy,hence investors could take advantage of the low extreme fall in stock prices to build an investment portfolio in the African biggest capital market since this comply with the principle of buy low sell high that is the anchor of feature trading anywhere in the world.

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