CONSUMER PROTECTION POLICY IN NIGERIA

ABSTRACT
Investment in securities in Nigeria is, by and large, still a strictly elitist venture.  The highest concentration of investors are in the urban areas such as Lagos. Ibadan, Port-Harcourt, Onitsha, Yola, Kano and the Federal Capital Territory. Abuja.  This perhaps informs the reason why the Nigerian Stock Exchange has created trading floors in all these cities to facilitate the business of stock trading in the Nigerian Capital Market. Investment in securities is highly dependent on customer confidence.  Just like other sectors of the Nigerian Financial System.  Where the customer lacks confidence in the system there is bound to be paucity of investment. Investors get about losing confidence in the system when the market is fraught with such negative vices as market rigging eloping with investors fund buying and not having money to pay buying from investors who have nothing to sell etc.  One major question which this research has sought to find answers to is the level of protection at the disposal of an innocent investor in securities in the Nigeria Capital market in the event of loss of his or her hard earned resources in the course of engaging in legitimate transaction with member of the market. It is gratifying to note that there are adequate protection measures by way of regulation/control of the Market by the Nigerian Stock Exchange, the Securities Exchange Commission, the Central Bank of Nigeria the Central Securities clearing system and even the Commercial Banks through which all the financial transaction in the market pass. A sad realization, however, is that about 36% of investors in securities do not even know that the market offer these protections. Another 46% invest in securities because it is simply fashionable doing so. One 35% of investors take keen interest in the market trends on a day to day basis sell when prices are high and buy when prices are low.