By Peter OBIORA investadvocate

Jan 11 2011 07.30 GMT

Lagos (INVESTADVOCATE)-Nigeria’s Clearing House, the Central Securities and Clearing System (CSCS) Limited has reported it cleared and settled a total of 646.1 billion units of shares in 13 years; from 1997 to December 31 2010.

 

Onyewuchi Asinobi, Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer (MD/CEO) of the CSCS confirmed this Monday January 10 2011 in a review of the Clearing House performance for year 2010 at the Stock Exchange in Lagos Nigeria.

 

“From 1997 to December 31 2010, CSCS has cleared and settled a total of 646.1 billion units of shares” Asinobi said.

 

“It is interesting to note that since 1997 to 2010, CSCS has cleared and settled transactions worth N7.2 trillion” the MD/CEO of the Nigeria’s Clearing House said.

 

He affirmed that for year 2010, the CSCS cleared and settled transactions valued at N798 billion compared to N685.7 billion in year 2009 indicating an increase in cleared and settled transactions by 16.4 percent (16.4%) in the review period.

 

Asinobi further affirmed that for year 2010, a Turnover of N3.88 billion was made compared to N3.2 billion recorded in 2009; representing an increase of 21.25% in the period under review.

 

According to Asinobi, for year 2010, the volume of cleared and settled transactions recorded by CSCS stood at 93.3 billion units of shares compared to 102.8 billion units of shares in year 2009; showing a decline of 9.2% in the volume of cleared and settled transaction in the review period.

 

The CSCS CEO also confirmed that since 1997 to December 31 2010, only 9,204 shareholders have requested for their share certificates; while in the year under review, 62 shareholders requested for share certificates compared to 109 in year 2009; representing a decrease of 43.1%.

 

“There are now over 4.5 million shareholders in the CSCS system going by statistics gathered at the end of 2010 in comparison with over 4.32 million shareholders recorded in 2009, this statistics shows a growth of 4.2% in the number of shareholders who maintain accounts with the Clearing House” he said.

 

Asinobi further said that 437 shareholders used their shareholding in CSCS depository as collateral to obtain loan in year 2010 compared to 1,550 shareholders in year 2009; representing a drop of 71.8%.

 

“More than 15,643 shareholders have used their shareholding as collateral for loan since inception of CSCS to year end 2010” he said.

 

On the issue of dematerialisation, the MD/CEO of CSCS said the Clearing House dematerialised 886,124 share certificates for year 2010 compared to 2.0 million in year 2009; indicating a decrease of 55.7% in the review period.

 

“While from inception, the CSSC has thus far dematerialised 13.4 million share certificates” Asinobi affirmed.