Key Factors
- Ahonsi Unuigbe met with Dubai Monetary Market leaders to strengthen NGX and NASDAQ Dubai cross-listing partnerships.
- Dubai’s capital markets provide Nigerian companies entry to deeper funding, world visibility, and improved governance requirements.
- Unuigbe’s push displays a severe technique to attach African firms with world capital, not symbolic, however structural.
Nigerian vitality mogul Ahonsi Unuigbe is working to hyperlink Africa’s enterprise panorama with the worldwide monetary system. His latest go to to the Dubai Monetary Market (DFM) was greater than a ceremonial journey, it was a sensible step towards forging stronger funding ties between Nigeria and the United Arab Emirates.
Forging market hyperlinks past ceremony
Unuigbe, who chairs the Nigerian Trade Group (NGX) and leads Petralon Vitality, met with senior DFM officers together with CEO Hamed Ahmed Ali and Joel Tilly, affiliate vp of enterprise improvement for Africa. Their conversations centered on enhancing the settlement between NGX and NASDAQ Dubai. On the middle of those talks was a shared objective: to create simpler pathways for Nigerian firms, particularly in vitality, to record on each exchanges.
“The UAE presents a compelling case for African corporates, particularly within the vitality sector, with its superior regulatory frameworks, deep capital markets, and robust sector experience,” Unuigbe mentioned. “At NGX, we’re dedicated to leveraging these cross-border synergies to drive actual worth for each markets.”
Dubai markets provide deep capital entry
Dubai has spent years reshaping its capital markets to help long-term funding. By means of DFM and NASDAQ Dubai, town has developed a system that not solely welcomes preliminary public choices however helps firms effectively past their itemizing. These exchanges, with a mixed market worth of greater than $1 trillion, are actually positioned as world platforms with extra capital than offers to fund, a chance African companies may use to their benefit.
For Nigerian companies, the enchantment is easy. Entry to deeper capital swimming pools, higher governance requirements, and world visibility might be game-changing, particularly in an setting the place elevating long-term funds at truthful charges is a continuing wrestle. Unuigbe’s push isn’t about symbolic alignment. It’s about unlocking sensible alternatives for African companies to lift funds and scale operations internationally.
Unuigbe additionally added, “By bridging the data and entry hole between Nigerian enterprises and worldwide markets, we’re laying the inspiration for a stronger financial development, investor participation, and long-term worth creation”.
Nonetheless, success received’t come mechanically. Either side acknowledged that smoother regulatory and diplomatic coordination between Nigeria and the UAE will probably be essential. With out that, progress may stall. However Unuigbe’s go to underscored a deeper dedication. He wasn’t there merely as NGX chairman. He got here as a enterprise chief with firsthand data of what it takes to construct and maintain an organization in robust markets.
Bridging Nigeria and world finance
At Petralon Vitality, the place Ahonsi Unuigbe serves as CEO, the Nigerian vitality mogul has steadily grown the corporate right into a revered operator in oil and gasoline. Identified for taking calculated dangers and forming good partnerships, Petralon has earned a fame for stability and strategic pondering, qualities which have turn out to be much more vital in at present’s risky vitality panorama.
Unuigbe’s path started in funding banking, the place he developed a deep understanding of markets, danger, and long-term planning. That background now informs each a part of his work. Past Petralon, his portfolio consists of Prime Oil & Fuel Coöperatief UA, BTF Oil & Fuel, and a big stake in Canada’s Africa Oil Corp., which operates throughout the continent. Collectively, these ventures place him amongst Nigeria’s most profitable and influential enterprise figures.
Observe file anchored in actual development
Ahonsi Unuigbe’s management has earned recognition. In 2009, he was named a Desmond Tutu Fellow by the African Management Institute, becoming a member of a gaggle of leaders chosen for his or her contributions to the continent’s improvement. However awards are simply a part of the story. What defines Unuigbe’s work is a constant effort to hyperlink African enterprise with world alternative, by means of coverage, capital, and partnerships that ship outcomes.
As chairman of NGX, he’s navigating a tough financial local weather whereas pushing for reforms, higher oversight, and improved entry to capital for Nigerian companies. He has made it clear that opening new doorways for African firms means partaking significantly with world requirements, not simply in principle, however in motion.
For Dubai, Unuigbe’s go to indicators a readiness from African markets to be a part of the broader monetary dialog. And for Nigeria, it’s a reminder of what’s doable when skilled professionals lead with readability and objective. In a world the place traders are more and more rising markets for development, Unuigbe is ensuring African firms should not unnoticed. They’re not ready for permission. They’re able to take their place, and compete on truthful phrases.
