Lagos, Nigeria – 27 April 2021 – Central Securities Clearing System (CSCS) Plc, Nigeria’s capital market infrastructure, bagged the prestigious Market Choice award and celebrated for its outstanding counterparty trust assurance, broad asset class coverage, enhanced collaboration with market participants and its commitment to market efficiency and growth at the BusinessDay Nigerian Investor Value Awards (NIVA), which took place over the weekend, in Lagos.

Stakeholders in the Nigerian capital market extoled CSCS and its leadership for resilience and continuous investment in market-wide initiatives aimed at ensuring the mutual prosperity of all stakeholders.

The event, previously known as the Top CEOs and Next Bulls Awards, has been jointly organized by BusinessDay and the Nigerian Exchange Limited (NGX) since 2015. It was conceived as a platform to celebrate the CEOs of listed companies that have delivered superior value to investors through operating efficiencies, organizational values, and market engagement activities.

The Awards was further expanded to include the CEOs of carefully vetted non-listed companies that could fill a pipeline of initial public offering candidates, particularly companies in which active and informed investors have expressed a strong demand to own their shares if their shareholders decide to take them public.

While receiving the award, the Chief Executive Officer of CSCS Plc, Mr. Haruna Jalo-Waziri, said the award was a call for continuous improvement and a boost to CSCS’ tenacious commitment to delivering on market-efficiency initiatives.

According to Mr. Jalo-Waziri, “My colleagues and I would like to dedicate this award to our esteemed participants, whose loyalty, support and constructive feedbacks continue to enhance our operations and broader service to the Nigerian capital market. As we relish this recognition of CSCS as the “Market Choice”, we reiterate our kaizen philosophy of continuous improvement and restate our enthusiasm in furthering our partnerships with esteemed participants and broader stakeholders in our quest for mutual prosperity and in our drive towards enhancing market efficiency and growth.

“I would like to express my profound gratitude to our regulator, the Securities and Exchange Commission as well as the Board of Directors of CSCS for their diligent oversight and for ensuring sound governance which I believe is essential to every corporate’s sustainability and long-term value creation.”

“To my colleagues, some of whom are here with me to receive this award, I say well done but I would continue to remind you that the reward of good work is more work. I know the stakes are higher as we have set new benchmarks, albeit I am more than ever optimistic in our capacity to do more and work with our participants in delivering better experience and value to investors in the Nigerian capital market.”, Mr. Jalo-Waziri added.

Over the past three years, the ordinary shares of CSCS, though not yet listed on the floor of the NGX, actively trades on the Nigerian Autonomous Securities Dealers Over-the-Counter (NASD-OTC) Exchange and has emerged as the most liquid and attractive stock on the NASD-OTC. Last Friday, for instance, CSCS gained 65 kobo or 4.1 per cent to close at N16.65 per unit, consolidating its year-to-date gain to 10.6%, compared to the current bearish performance of equities. More so, the shares of CSCS has rallied 93% over the past three years, in addition to the company growing its dividend payment by 36% over the same period.

Remarkably, a total of 1.64 billion units of CSCS’ shares, valued at N27.06 billion (based on current valuation of N16.50 per share) and representing 38.8% or one-third of the total shares outstanding of the company have been traded over the past three years. The liquidity of the shares is notwithstanding the fact that the top-5 largest shareholders closely hold about two-third of the company’s shares.

The liquidity of the shares of CSCS on the NASD-OTC platform reinforces the strong appetite and demand of retail and institutional shareholders to own CSCS’ shares. In addition to the steady bull run on the share price, CSCS’ steady dividend payment has been a major attraction to investors, who seek stable return on investments.

About CSCS

The Central Securities Clearing System (CSCS) is a Public Limited Company, with a diversified shareholder base, including the Nigerian Stock Exchange, some of the largest banks in Nigeria, private equity firms, other corporates and individual shareholders.  With over two decades of operation, serving as the Central Securities Depository for the Nigerian Capital Market, CSCS has been pivotal to the growth and transformation of the capital market, including its audacious full dematerialization of share certificates and the shortening of settlement cycle in the capital market.

CSCS serves as the Central Securities Depository for Equities, Commercial Papers, Corporate Bonds, Sub-National Bonds, certain Sovereign Bonds (such as FGN Sukuk and FGN Savings Bond), Equity-traded Funds, Real estate Investment Trusts, Mutual funds and Commodities. CSCS is licensed and regulated by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The activities of CSCS are governed by the Investment and Securities Act 2007, the Companies and Allied Matters Act 2004, and the SEC Rules.

Leveraging on digital technologies, CSCS serves the market through varying channels, including its web portal; www.cscs.ng; online and mobile applications, web chatbot and, customer service call centre; 070 CALL CSCS – 070022552727 or 01 448 0500 amongst others.

CONTACT: [email protected]