E-dividend: Investors praise SEC, raise concerns about registrars

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and other market stakeholders have been commended on the issues of e-dividend, unclaimed-dividend solutions and extension of deadline on e-dividend registration by shareholders in the country.

A shareholder activist and co-Founder Nigeria Shareholders Solidarity Association (NSSA), Alhaji Gbadebo Olatokunbo in a statement made available to Business247 News Online at the weekend, in addition to commending SEC on the directive to the registrars to offload old unclaimed dividend into the account of old and new e-dividend registrations, he appealed that the directive should also take care of discrimination on public/secondary/multiple-applicants of stocks by registrars.

According to him, “It is common knowledge that despite that an investor did the needful on e-dividend mandate, the registrars still treat public offers differently from secondary-purchase/CSCS platform while multiple applicants/accounts and those with different signatures in single company were also at the receiving-end on e-dividend and unclaimed-dividend” which he said are part of the causes for the huge unclaimed-dividend.

According to Olatokunbo, “I am a victim of secondary-purchase/CSCS platform and when l raised the issues with the registrars was directed to obtain certain information from my stockbrokers before my e-dividend-mandate could be implemented am still on it, till date”.

“We shall be grateful, if SEC,NSE, CSCS, registrars and other stakeholders could consider and work out solutions on the above observations before the deadline given by SEC”.

It would be recalled that the Director-General of the Securities and Exchange Commission of Nigeria (SEC), Mr. Mounir Gwarzo, revealed on Wednesday that only 6,000 investors have registered on e-dividend portal since the inception last year, as against projections of one million e-dividend registrations.

According to him, “We are still having issues in respect of e-dividend registration. The report we got recently was very discouraging. Only about 6,000 domestic investors have registered for the e-dividend,” he said, while observing that there were issues with Registrars and Banks as they have not come to an agreement on the modalities,” he said.

Gwarzo, while briefing the press on the key developments and deliberations made during the second quarter Capital Market Committee (CMC) meeting, explained that SEC was working closely with the banks and registrars nationwide to boost the e-dividend registration process in the country.

To tackle the issue, the SEC DG explained that a meeting has been held with all the bank representatives and registrars where it was agreed that both parties appoint e-dividend champions that would help drive the process effectively.

Gwarzo further explained that on its part, the Nigerian Inter-Bank Settlement Systems (NIBSS), commitment has been made to assist both party in clarifications when required for the e-dividend registration.

Speaking further, Gwarzo said by June 30th, 2017 no registrar will issue dividend warrant again in the country, signalling the era of e-dividend. In view of this, he announced that SEC will underwrite the cost of e-dividend registration till December, 2016.

He, however, called for maximum support from the media in the area of awareness/sensitization of the pubic on the gains and essence of the e-dividend registration.