Business
Listings Improves Share Index On Stock Market
For the outgoing 2009, many listings, where additional shares were added to existing shares, were done on the floor of the Nigerian Stock Exchange under different names and categories. These included supplementary listings, which included bonuses, public offerings and right issues, irredeemable preference shares of Intercontinental Bank Plc, irredeemable non-cumulative convertible debenture stocks of Crusader Plc, placements, and introduction.
Though in all, the new companies that joined the exchange were essentially through listing by introduction, in all, 12 new companies joined the league of quoted companies. They are IHS Plc, Pinnacle point Plc, Courteville Plc, MTECH Communications Plc, Beco Petroleum Plc, Honeywell Flour Plc, Resort savings & Loans Plc, and GT Assurance Plc.
The volume of shares listed by these companies ranged from 400 million shares of Portland paints to 16.7 billion shares of African Alliance. Shares admitted for the year cut across many of the subsector of the exchange, with information and communication with the highest number of three equities. A summary of the value against volume showed that the exchange was boosted with over N271 billion. Honey well pulled the highest capitalization with N67 billion, African Alliance Insurance Pulled N58 billion while GT Assurance pulled N30 billion of that total value.
When the 2008 listing is compared with 2009, the pervious year had nine more equities. In 2008, many high capitalized equities like Dangote Flour Mills Plc, Star-comms Plc, Daar Communications, among others joined the league of quoted companies as against those that joined this year. The bearish run in the market, which had formed a bad trend of share prille depreciation for newly listed shares, prevented many companies that had promised investors that they would list their shares this year in their private placement documents from doing so.
Speaking on the new listings, the Managing Director, DBSS securities Limited, Mr Emmanuel Etc, said having more companies to come and list their shares on the exchange gives symbiosis benefits for both the company and the exchange. According to Eze, the exchange becomes deepened with more shares being listed and the companies themselves have enhanced status to do business globally because of their public quoting status.
Once a company becomes quoted, it enhances the value, born at home and abroad they will not want to have anything to do with companies here if they are not quoted, so, it enhances their status. It enhances the value of original shares they have before, because now their shares are not traded.
So, once their shares are on the exchange they becomes subject to market forces, and when the market forces set in the share that is at par value begins to increase to N2, N4 and so on.” On that benefits to the market, Eze said”, . One of the problems of the stock market today is still volume. The market is still shallow. So, the more companies that come the deeper the market becomes. This is to the benefit of the exchange and others stakeholders.
Cornerstone of Financial Services
A survey of more than 1 000 global finance leaders undertaken by digital payment network Ripple shows that 72% of respondents believe they need to offer a digital asset solution to remain competitive.
According to Ripple, leaders from the banking, fintech, corporate and asset management sector have made it clear that the “digital asset revolution is happening now”.
“Digital assets are quickly becoming a cornerstone of financial services, underpinned by progressive regulation, growing interest from Tier-1 banks, a steady consumer shift from banks to fintech providers, and booming stablecoin adoption,” Ripple says.
The survey was conducted in early 2026 and the findings released in March.
Stablecoin Boon or Bane?
Ripple has experienced significant success in the stablecoin sector since launching its Ripple USD (RLUSD) stablecoin in 2024.
With a market cap of $1.56 billion, it is considered a major regulated player in the market.
No doubt the platform was pleased to learn through its own survey that financial leaders were most bullish about stablecoins.
Roughly three-quarters of respondents believed they could boost cash-flow efficiency and unlock trapped working capital.
Ripple noted that finance leaders were thinking about stablecoins as more than “just a new way to execute payments”; instead, they viewed them as effective tools for treasury management.
In March 2026, Ripple began testing a new trade finance model built around RLUSD in a bid to increase the speed of cross-border payments.
The pilot initiative, developed alongside supply chain finance company Unloq [https://unloq.com], is running on the XRP Ledger inside a testing framework developed by the Monetary Authority of Singapore.
The Asian city-state is one of the platform’s biggest growth markets.
The idea behind the project is to see whether stablecoin-based settlement can streamline trade finance, too often hampered by reliance on intermediaries and slow reconciliation.
The only potential drawback is that if the initiative takes off, the Ripple to USD price could be negatively affected.
Ripple has always championed its native XRP token as a bridge asset, the “middleman” in the process of a financial institution turning dollars in the US into pounds in the UK, for example.
Ripple converts dollars into XRP and then back into pounds.
If RLUSD can do exactly the same thing, questions will be asked about XRP’s relevance.
That is a bridge Ripple will have to cross if it gets to that point.
Tokenisation Partners
Another interesting finding from Ripple’s survey is that most banks and asset managers are seeking tokenisation partners to help execute their strategies.
Some 89% of respondents said digital asset storage and custody were top priority. “Token servicing/lifecycle management also ranks highly for banks at 82%, while asset managers place greater emphasis on primary distribution at 80%,” Ripple found.
The survey also revealed that just more than half of fintechs and financial institutions want an infrastructure provider that can offer a “one-stop-shop solution”. This rose to 71% among corporate financial leaders.
Ripple attributes this to institutions and firms wanting uncomplicated, cohesive systems.
Infrastructure Rules
In its final analysis, Ripple says companies across the board are looking for partners and solutions that are “secure, compliant, battle-tested and that enable growth and execution”.
“The message is clear: infrastructure decisions made today will shape competitive positioning tomorrow.”
No surprise that this is precisely where Ripple is placing much of its focus.
