FMDQ Holdings Plc, on Friday in Lagos, held its Annual General Meeting (AGM) virtually in compliance with the COVID-19 directives and guidelines of the Lagos State Government that prohibits gatherings of more than 20 persons, via zoom.
Addressing the shareholders, the newly appointed board chairman, Dr. Kingsley Obiora, Deputy Governor, Economic Policy at the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), said the group, through FMDQ Securities Exchange, admitted a total of 84 securities.
These comprise bonds, Commercial Papers (CPs), and funds from various sectors for listing and quotation on its platform, in addition to the registration of several CP Programmes.
Presenting the Financial Statements for the year ended December 31, 2019, Obiora noted the group’s “resilient performance amidst the challenging operating environment” in a year when the group strengthened the operational and strategic capacities its clearing, settlement, and depository businesses.
This, the group added in a statement, is in line with their drive to create value for stakeholders in the Nigerian financial market, following which FMDQ Clear, a subsidiary, focused on building operational readiness and capabilities to extend its services from just clearing and settlement to providing central counterparty (CCP) services in the near term.
FMDQ Depository, on its part, leveraged the digitised and integrated structure of FMDQ Group to operationalise its new business; yielding positive results and further paving the way for the Depository to actualise its vision of becoming the depository of choice in Nigeria.
He also noted “strategic initiatives implemented in its first strategic lustrum (2015 – 2019), which mitigated the impact of volatile market conditions.”
Dr. Obiora described 2019 as “a year of growth, expansion, and reorganisation for FMDQ, with the consolidation of its flagship wholly owned subsidiary, FMDQ Exchange, the second year of the operationalisation of its wholly owned subsidiary, FMDQ Clear, and the activation of another wholly owned subsidiary, FMDQ Depository, making significant progress in its bid to help de-risk the financial markets by constructing market infrastructures in all components of the capital market value chain, from pre-trade, trade to post-trade.”
Furthermore, as part of the Ordinary Business of the AGM, the shareholders of FMDQ ratified, amongst other things, the appointment of Dr. Obiora as new Group Chairman; Emeka Onwuka, Partner and Head of Private Clients & Family Wealth Practice at Andersen Tax in Nigeria; and Sadiq Mohammed, Deputy Group Chief Executive Officer of the Asset & Resource Management (ARM) both serving as Non-Executive Directors on the Board of FMDQ.
On the outlook for the business, the Group Managing Director/Chief Executive, Bola Onadele. Koko, restated FMDQ’s commitment, with the collaboration of stakeholders, to the development of a thriving derivatives market in the country by launching new hedging products in 2020.
Furthermore, he pledged the group’s readiness to continue enhancing the readiness of FMDQ Clear to operate a fully-fledged CCP upon regulatory approval, whilst making efforts through FMDQ Depository to facilitate interoperability amongst the central securities depositories in Nigeria to enable seamless processing of clients’ transactions.
With the incorporation of its newest wholly owned subsidiary, FMDQ Private Markets Limited in January 2020, he said the group shall focus on promoting the development of organised private capital, providing the much-needed transparency in the market for private debt and equity securities, by eliminating information asymmetry and ultimately improving credibility in the market for private issuances.
