Invest Data Consulting Ltd

A survey by NOI Polls, Nigeria’s foremost pollster, on Thursday, showed that an estimated 60m Nigerians, translating to four of every 10, aged 18-40, engage in sports betting, lured by grinding twin evils of unemployment and underemployment, especially among the country’s vibrant youth population. NOIPolls recalled a report by the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) that these 60m Nigerians spend up to N1.8bn on sports betting daily, based on an average investment of N3,000 per day, which could translate to about N50bn monthly. This, the survey showed, has been helped by sports betting, which is both online and offline, as well as a gaming industry that has grown geometrically in the past few years, with many operators springing up across the country and occupying every let-able space in most commercial centers. This remarkable growth is attributable also to the country’s population and increased access to the internet via enabled internet devices such as mobile phones, tablets, lapto...

While the public eagerly await the court ruling on the dispute over ownership of Mining Lease No 2541 in Obu, Okpella, in Edo State between Dangote Industries Ltd and BUA Group, both conglomerates again continued their verbal war with each asserting their claims and counters. Dangote Group in a statement on Thursday night, which it said was to further re-assured its shareholders, the regulators and members of the public that it is the true owner, faulted “BUA’s fraudulent claim that the Dangote Group is trying to monopolize the cement business in the Country.” It said “BUA has willfully, deliberately and mischievously concealed the fact that it has at least 12 Mining/Quarry Leases within and around the area in question as opposed to this sole Mining Lease No 2541 owned by the Dangote Group.” However, in its response Friday morning, BUA management accused Dangote Group of furthering “its cycle of misinformation over the mining dispute… through falsehoods and bigger lies,” stre...

All over the world, the stock market is acknowledged as a leading indicator and a discounting machine, which points to future expectations from any economy because almost all major sectors of that economy are represented. In the same way, it equally factors the expected future of the economy into prices of equities listed, which means that 50 to 80% of the economic and market fundamentals influences equity prices. While the performance of a company has 20 to 30% impact on its share price since the industries and sectors are integral parts of the economy at any time. Contrary to fears some investors may be entertaining at the moment, if any, the current rally of Nigeria’s stock market is not artificial,given that the bourse has suffered three consecutive years of negative growth. This resulted from the effects of an unholy combination of multiple evils such as: Low consumer confidence, low oil price at almost $28 in January 2016, low national output that resulted in econo...