Why we must drive Africa’s capital market with technology — Owoturo

By Peter Egwuatu 

The Chief Executive Officer, Coronation Registrar Limited, Oluseyi Owoturo, has stressed the value of exertion successful driving Africa ‘s superior market.

In his interactions with the media successful Lagos, helium revealed   that successful June 2025, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) directed nationalist companies and their registrars to comply with the Finance Act 2020, mandating that dividends unclaimed for six years oregon much beryllium transferred to the Unclaimed Funds Trust Fund (UFTF).  

According to him, this determination reflects a increasing absorption connected accountability, transparency, and capitalist extortion wrong our superior market.

“At Coronation Registrars Limited, we anticipated this displacement agelong earlier the directive. We rolled retired respective initiatives to guarantee that shareholders could assertion their dividends seamlessly. Working intimately with shareholder associations crossed Nigeria, we conducted nationwide sensitization campaigns, mapped mandates, validated accounts, and built systems to region friction from dividend payments. 

Today, the results are evident: a crisp simplification successful unclaimed dividends connected our registers and a renewed consciousness of spot from investors.

“But the question goes beyond unclaimed dividends. What benignant of registrar does Africa request to conscionable the challenges of a rapidly evolving fiscal landscape? Our reply is clear: a registrar built connected products, powered by platforms, and defined by innovation”.

Continuing, helium stressed that Coronation Registrars has positioned itself arsenic a marketplace person by investing successful integer solutions that code symptom points for some shareholders and issuers.  

“Consider Coronation Self-Service, a integer strategy that has processed implicit 20,000 shareholder requests without requiring a azygous bureau visit. By automating regular processes, we prevention investors clip and cost, portion freeing our squad to absorption connected much analyzable needs.

“Our flagship platforms, ShareholderLive and IssuerLive, are reshaping engagement connected some sides of the market. ShareholderLive is simply a one-stop hub wherever retail investors tin way dividends, presumption portfolio values successful existent time, entree yearly reports, and IssuerLive, connected the different hand, gives companies unprecedented penetration into stock performance, insider trading patterns, and shareholder behaviour—tools that are captious for strategical decision-making”.

Commenting connected Bond Processing Automation earlier introduced by Coronation this year, helium said : “   We launched Nigeria’s archetypal afloat automated enslaved processing workflow, covering everything from onboarding to computation and e-payment notifications. This end-to-end strategy eliminates manual delays, calculation errors, and fragmented capitalist communications.  

For issuers, it means faster turnaround times. For investors, it means greater transparency and confidence. For the market, it represents a important measurement guardant successful infrastructure modernisation.

This milestone was achieved alongside our ISO 9001:2015 Quality Management Certification, a designation of our semipermanent committedness to operational excellence and continuous improvement. Together, they bespeak our content that being a registrar is not conscionable astir maintaining records it is astir creating value.”

Commenting connected shareholders information astatine yearly meetings, Owoturo said: “With Coronation virtual, we person transformed however Annual General Meetings (AGMs) are conducted. 

No longer are shareholders constricted by geography; they tin present registry electronically, articulation meetings remotely, ballot successful existent time, and travel proceedings done data-friendly streaming. 

This innovation guarantees inclusivity and safeguards shareholder rights. 

Upcoming enhancements, specified arsenic proxy voting guidelines and instant engagement tools, volition instrumentality transparency and information to caller heights.

“These advances are not theoretical. Our way grounds speaks for itself. From managing 1 of Nigeria’s largest IPOs for MTN to executing seamless hybrid AGMs for Access Bank and Aradel, Coronation Registrars Limited has consistently delivered preci...