The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has said that it is setting up a special unit and developing a mobile application to address the pressing issue of unclaimed dividends in Nigeria’s capital market, which stood at a N215 billion as of March 2024.
The Director General of the SEC, Emomotimi Agama, revealed this during the post-Capital Market Committee (CMC) press briefing on Thursday as part of the Commission’s broader strategy to safeguard investor interests and enhance market confidence.
Agama noted that while it was impossible to reduce unclaimed dividends to zero, the SEC is committed to ensuring that eligible investors can easily reclaim their funds. “We are going to set up a special unit at the SEC that speaks directly to the issues of unclaimed dividends. We discovered that many investors are having minor challenges accessing those unclaimed dividends,” Agama stated.
He said the new unit will operate at the SEC headquarters and branch offices, providing a streamlined process for investors to recover their unclaimed dividends.
