Nigeria, the acclaimed most populous black nation, marked 10 years of a succesful transition from one civillian administration to another few days ago . However during the last ten years, a lot has happened in various sectors of the economy  and one of the affected sector is the financial sector, from the recapitalisation era to share scandals, but Democratic governance has no doubt impacted on the growth, performance and yields  in the sector espectially in the capital market.

The capital market has withnessed a "mixed grill" in the last 10 years.
For investors, it was a period of harvest between 1999 and March 2008 after which the market begin to withness what many believed still the worst experience ever at the market between April 2008 and December 2008.
The Nigerian stock market suffered its worst fall in the almost five decades history of the stock exchange in the nation, depreciating from N10.18 tr to N6.957tr by end of 2008 thereby loosing N3.223tr or 32 percent.

But however bad this may sound, there is still some better side of it as  the total number of listed equity rose to 207  as at May 2009 from 106 in 1999 while listed securities rose from 268 to 295 during the same period.

eventhough, the market withness a "mad rush" for shares in the last four years of the period under review with several share prices dropping below expectations while some very few are growing stronger, Market Capitalisation rose from N222.24bn in May 1999  to N12.39tr as at March 2008 before slidding to N6.5tr in May 2009.{eventhough its still an appreciation compare to about N4tr as at December 2008}

So many people  now only have  shares certificate {if  you are lucky to get yours} to look at , as the figure on some certicates {share value} has dropped and only a miracle can bring some of the companies back on track ..that is if they even survive anyway!, ...i pity the poor civil servants, i pity the poor market women, the average labourer who prior to now had thought buying shares or owning a piece of....a company is an automatic ticket to making millions, not knowing that there are lots more than they can see.
Anyway, the market hasnt really performed too badly in the last 10 years only that you need to look before you jump..like my area boyz paddy paddy will say, "Watch and shadow".

Its not all Naira and Kobo you have got that you have to pump into the market in anticipation for a multiple returns in few weeks {as some people think}, learn about the risk in the market seek advice from real proffessional {because there are lot of unreal ones out there}..and then invest a portion of your excess funds into the market and dont forget.."Watch and Shadow"