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Chinwendu Obienyi
First Bank Nigeria Holdings, Union Bank and Diamond Bank are among the 10 companies that could not meet the March 31 deadline given by the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) for filing of audited financial reports.
In statements posted on the exchange’s website, the companies notified the public of the delay and made their reasons known to the regulator.
The defaulting quoted companies include First Bank, Diamond Bank, Fidelity Bank, International Breweries, Linkage Assurance, Abbey Mortgage Bank, Guinea Insurance, Lafarge Africa Plc, Mutual Benefits and Union Bank.
“The reason for the delay is purely due to the peculiarity of FBNH’s group structure. FBNH has subsidiary companies operating in the banking and insurance sectors as well as the capital market, all with a common financial year end of December 31 alongside the holding company,” Seye Kosoko, First Bank’s Company Secretary, said.
“Each of these subsidiaries needs to audit its financial statements and obtain the approval of respective regulator prior to submission to FBNH for consolidation. Thereafter, FBNH is also required to obtain the approval of its primary regulator before submission and filing with the exchange.”
Fidelity Bank said the late filing was due to delay in concluding audit of the report.
Linkage Assurance Plc said it could not secure the approval of National Insurance Commission, its primary regulator, before the filing deadline, while International Breweries, which filed its audited financial statements for 2017 on April 4, said the delay was due to consolidation of the accounts of newly merged entities with that of the company. The company merged with Pabod Breweries and Intafact Beverages on November 13, 2017.
Meanwhile, equities on the floor of the NSE, yesterday, made a moderate recovery with market capitalisation soaring by N45 billion, its first positive performance in April after two straight negative sessions.
Specifically, at the close of trading yesterday, the All Share Index (ASI) increased by 0.31 per cent or 125.83 points to close at 40,875.69 points from 40,749.86 points achieved on Wednesday.
The positive performance was attributed to price rebounds by bellwether stocks across the major sectors of the market.
Although the industrial goods (+0.65 per cent), insurance (+0.44 per cent), banking (+0.27 per cent) and the oil and gas (+0.08 per cent) indices closed in the green, the consumer goods (-0.83 per cent) sector closed in the negative territory. Investors took advantage of the recent drop in some choice stocks, driving the total volume of stocks traded higher by 495.64 million shares valued at N7.67 billion in 4,614 deals even as 22 stocks depreciated in value while 21 others appreciated.
