MTHULISI SIBANDA
JOHANNESBURG – THE Committee of the Southern African Development Community Stock Exchanges (CoSSE) has initiated steps towards the Interconnectivity Hub Project.
This is aimed at enabling enterprises raise capital across all countries in the region.
This follows the inaugural SADC Brokers’ Networking session at the Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE)in South Africa.
The session, which was attended by SADC brokers, was a platform for brokers to meet each other and share information about their respective markets, with the objective of encouraging cross-border trading.
Vice Chairman of CoSSE and Chief Executive Officer of the Namibian Stock Exchange, Tiaan Bazuin, who oversaw the session says, the goal was to have all SADC brokers in the same room, with the concept of signing associate agreements.
“Typically brokers service their local markets and have associate agreements with South African brokers where they trade South African stock, which are more liquid than all other African stocks,” says Bazuin.
“Now, the idea is to have all SADC brokers signing associate agreements with brokers in each SADC country, with the aim of trading each other’s stocks.”
Bazuin says this is the first step towards more harmonisation, regionalisation and integration.
“It is about how to interconnect markets and how to grow other African markets outside the massive South African market. Most importantly, it will help us to keep African capital in Africa instead of shipping it off overseas.”
CoSSE was established in 1997 as a collective body of the various stock exchanges in the SADC, with the objective of increasing market liquidity in the region, enhancing trading in various securities within the region, and encouraging the development of a harmonised securities market environment within the SADC.
Once the CoSSE Interconnectivity Hub Project is fully implemented, it will combine markets to get more opportunities to invest and secure more investors.
– Guardian