By Bassey Udo
Fewer than three million Nigerians or four percent of the country’s adult population are active investors in the capital market, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has disclosed.
The Director-General of the SEC, Dr. Emomotimi Agama, who disclosed this in Abuja lamented that more than 60 million others engage daily in gambling activities, spending an estimated $5.5 million every day.
Agama who was presenting a lead paper titled: “Evaluating the Nigerian Capital Market Masterplan 2015-2025” at the annual conference of the Chartered Institute of Stockbrokers, described low participation of Nigerians in the traditional capital market as alarming.
The SEC DG who described the low participation rate in the capital market as a major impediment to economic growth and capital formation, disclosed that over $50bn worth of cryptocurrency transactions flowed through Nigeria between July 2023 and June 2024.
This, he noted, underscored the sophistication and risk tolerance of Nigerian investors that the traditional market is yet to capture.
“This reveals a paradox that an appetite for risk clearly exists, but not the trust or access to channel that energy into productive investment,” he said.
Agama also lamented that Nigeria’s market capitalization-to-GDP ratio stands at about 30 percent, far below South Africa’s 320 percent, Malaysia’s 123 percent, and India’s 92 percent, a disparity, he noted, highlights the urgent need to deepen financial inclusion and rebuild investor confidence.
Recalling the ten-year vision of the Certified Marketing Management Professionals (CMMP) launched in 2015, the SEC boss said it was designed to reposition Nigeria’s capital market as the engine of economic transformation by mobilizing long-term finance for infrastructure and enterprise development.
“Today, as we stand at the sunset of that ten-year plan, our task is not ceremonial; it is reflective and diagnostic. We must ask: what did we achieve? Where did we fall short, and what lessons must anchor our next decade of reforms?” he stated.
Agama disclosed that less than half of the 108 initiatives under the CMMP were fully achieved, blaming limited alignment with national development plans, inadequate tracking metrics, and weak stakeholder ownership for the shortfall.
Despite progress in areas such as Green Bonds, Sukuk, fintech integration, and non-interest finance, he said market liquidity remains concentrated in a few large-cap stocks like Airtel Africa, Dangote Cement, and MTN Nigeria.
Agama, who listed six key challenges for the next phase of reforms in the capital market, pointed at low retail participation, market concentration, falling foreign inflows, underutilized pension assets, untapped diaspora capital, and a widening infrastructure financing gap.
“Nigeria’s $150 billion annual infrastructure deficit far exceeds the market’s contribution, with only N1.5 trillion approved in Public-Private Partnership (PPP) bonds. This shows a misalignment between financial innovation and national priorities,” he observed.
The DG called for a “reimagined SEC” that serves as both regulator and enabler of private-sector-driven growth, adding that the next decade must focus on trust-building, transparency, and inclusion.
“Vision without execution is inertia — and reform without measurement is aspiration without accountability,” he declared.
