ABUJA – An economist, Mr Henry Boyo, on Wednesday criticised the decision to mandate companies with shareholding funds of over N40 billion to be listed in the Nigeria Stock Exchange (NSE).
Boyo, who made the observation in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja, said the stock market was a free market and not a military market.
According to him, the bill before the National Assembly that would mandate companies with shareholding funds of over N40 billion to be listed in the NSE should not be passed.
“ Honestly I do not think the stock market is a military market; rather it is a free market so the issue of insisting is not part of it.
“ You do not force companies to list; the market is not a military market; customers are supposed to go to the market to list if they find the need to do so.
“ Because once you start doing that it will seem like a punishment to get listed rather than it being a voluntary decision to make your company a public company.
“ It is not for anybody to tell you to do that and once that starts happening, companies will start tampering with their figures because they do not want to be listed,’’ he said.
On the issue of banks using customer funds to acquire oil blocks shares, Boyo said it was a known fact that banks did not have money but depended on customer funds.
He said that the concern of banks was to find all possible ways of making money so long as it was a legitimate means.
“ Banks do not have money; they use customers’ money for everything and that is the nature of banking; it is the deposit of customers that banks use to lend to people.
“ If a bank is interested in making money, it has to look for all possibilities in making money so long as they are legitimate,” Boyo said. (NAN)
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