By Nkiruka Nnorom

The Managing Director/CEO of NASD OTC Securities Exchange Plc, Mr. Bola Ajomale, has said that investors’ preference for few of the companies trading on its platform, particularly, the Central Securities and Clearing System, CSCS, Friesland Campina Wamco Nigeria Plc, the producers of Peak milk, Niger Delta Exploration and Production, NDEP Plc and Afriland Properties Plc is borne out of availability of information on the stocks.

He said that management of the companies are taking advantage of the avenues provided by the Exchange to make information on their operations available to the investing public, thereby increasing interest and activity on their stocks.

“The major driver for most of these securities is information, so, if they do not give out information, then people don’t know what is happening with the company and whether they are doing well

Second is performance. You see, some companies may be doing well and people don’t know about it and they don’t get to buy their shares. There are some that are not doing particularly well financially but people are trading because the price has now been collectively adjusted. So, a lot depends on whether the market can adjust properly, to the pricing of the shares,” he explained.

Continuing, he stated:  “The WAMCo, NDEP Plc and CSCS you see are the companies that are very responsive when it comes to giving out information. And then some of the securities there are not very responsive in sharing information with the market. You don’t buy what you don’t know. That makes a lot of difference. So, what we do is that we encourage the companies to share information about their business with the market more often.”

Ajomale said that the Exchange has introduced various products to drive engagement between the companies that trade on its platform with the investing public, listing some of them to include Analysts Call and Independent Analysts research on the companies.

He explained: “Remember that last year we had a lot of Analysts Call where we call the companies to come and talk to the market and tell us how they are doing; it could be information that we are re-organising ourselves. That alone can engender activity on the securities.

“We also encourage independent analysts. In order words, we encourage analysts in our participating institutions to do research on companies and give us the information and when they do, we put it up on our website. “So, you find out that we have reports on companies like Afriland, and a couple of other companies,” he added.