News and developments on African capital markets, includes: African securities, African stock exchanges/stock markets, African equities, African bonds, African private equity/venture capital, and African social impact investment
West African stock exchange leaders are again talking about integrating the markets. The exchanges in Ghana, Nigeria, Sierra Leone and Cote d’Ivoire have said they will seek to integrate by 2014.
The ten stock exchanges of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) are working together to increase the effectiveness of their markets. The Committee of SADC Stock Exchanges (CoSSE) has agreed to concentrate on six priority areas in support of regional moves to more efficient capital markets.
The Nigerian Stock Exchange says it will have the fastest trading system in Africa when it upgrades its trading to NASDAQ OMX Group’s X-Stream platform, with a target date of second quarter of 2013. The new system will handle a wide range of instruments.
South Africa’s Minister of Finance, Pravin Gordhan said the continent needs to take advantage of having a market of 1bn people and some of the world’s fastest-growing economies: “You can’t ignore a continent like Africa. In the next 15-20 years the focus on Africa will sharpen.”
The number of investors from other East African countries opening trading accounts at Kenya’s Nairobi Stock Exchange is still very small, but has grown more consistently in the last 2 years than other categories of investors.
Developing Africa’s securities exchanges is critical for the continent’s development, with capital markets standing between huge demand for capital for growth and huge demand to invest. The key issues are on the agenda of The 15th Annual African Securities Exchange Association conference (in Marrakesh, Morocco), hosted by Casablanca Stock Exchange, 12-13 December.
The East African Monetary Union is supposed to be effective from 2012. Senior officials including central bank governors, capital markets authorities, insurance and pensions regulatory agencies and national statistics officials are to meet in the last week of April 2011 for a third negotiation round.
Dr James Ndahiro, Chairperson of the Rwanda Stock Exchange, said East African countries should form a single stock market by 2015.
The JSE securities exchange has appointed an advisory committee to boost its JSE Africa Board to achieve its mission and attracet dual listings to a world-class stock exchange platform and help attract capital.
The world is moving into fast consolidation of stock exchanges through mergers and acquisitions among the world’s giant exchanges. London Stock Exchange chief executive Xavier Rolet said: “In five years there will be three, four international exchange groups with global distribution capabilities”.