4teelaw: answer to your question:

www.rfcng.com

Invest in the real sector of the Nigerian Economy, earn high returns on your investment, short tenored investments, 30 days, 60 days, 90days depends on your risk appetite. Financial advisory and SME Business advisory services also available.

blink182: Mutual funds are for lazy investors hence you shouldn't expect much.

delgroveng:
Don't u think that is jumping to naive conclusion.
M/ funds are for a purpose. For investors with little time or less informed about financial investment but idle cash.
While for the the economy they act as allocating resources much efficiently based on returns risk. Lesser risk..lower returns...higher perceived risk...investors expect higher returns...i plan to introduce depository receipt in Nigeria...American, japanese stocks for naija investors to better balance their portfolio.
If u like the idea tick like

shalomblue: Please don't go near ARM,u ll lose your fund if you do.

deenee: Apparently, there are a lot of uninformed people on this thread.

Mutual funds are not a bad idea once you get your investment strategy right.

What I see with most typical Nigerian investors is that they always want the quick way out. Always looking for the next "big transaction" that will turn their investment principal of 100k into 10 million etc etc. However, sorry to bust your bubble investments are not that way and if you are not rightly informed and use the information in due course, there is a high tendency to be back at "ground zero".


A mutual fund is a collective unit investment scheme where a fund manager pulls together funds from all categories of investors (retail, corporate, institutional, government etc) and put such in varying investment vehicles depending on the risk appetite, expected ROI and investment decision of the investors. A unit price is usually ascribed to the pooled investment scheme. This is the reason why we have mutual fund managers that use names such as "aggressive growth fund, equity fund, capital market fund, ethical fund, money market fund" etc all coined to differentiate the different classes of investment.

The name used for the type of pooled investment is usually determined by two basic factors namely the risk appetite and expected returns. Hence in this regard, a money market fund would typical fit investors that are risk averse and would prefer just minimal returns on their investments which would mostly consist of government backed securities (T.bills, bonds etc). A risk loving investor might consider investments in aggressive or equity fund wherein risk is high and so also returns.

Mutual funds can also be closed ended or opened ended. A closed ended MF is one where the fund is not open to secondary investors and wherein an original investor can only liquidate their investment after an agreed period has elapsed. This type is very uncommon in Nigeria and used mostly by pension fund managers in the West. The open ended is the opposite.

I usually advice people to have a portfolio depending on their risk appetite. A typical portfolio should have the following cash, FD, Tbills, your voluntary RSA contributions with a seasoned PFA,money and capital market investments, proprietary holdings, real estate (not essential for beginners) and mutual fund investments. The advantage with MF of course is that you don't have to worry about daily monitoring as you are already paying the fund manager to do that and there is also the risk of portfolio decline as we have with all other investments including the "almighty risk free T bills".

Speaking of T bills, do people really consider the real rate of inflation when calculating their ROI on T bills? I guess the answer is in the "affirmative" since every body here seems to think that T bills is the next best thing after man "discovered fire" and for those who think that T bills are risk free, just wait till the government defaults on repayment of a maturing T bill tranche.

I guess a lot of people are quick to forget the silent trigger that caused what we all now know as the "European Debt Crisis".

Finally, please do your homework well, read far and wide, understand why you want to invest, create a balance between short term profit taking and long term gratification, check the amount of funds you are willing to commit and lose (yes you will surely lose some) and ensure that your investment strategy is backed up by consistency in three areas namely....consistent contributions, capital reinvestment and continuous learning

All the best!

Alumnus: I intend to constantly invest a certain percentage of my salary on stocks for few coming years. But am confused on whether to make individual investment or go through Mutual Fund managers. I have been investing individually with my small funds before now but haven't tried mutual fund before.

Please your experiences and advice on Mutual funds in Nigeria will be greatly appreciated.

deenee: @ manie.....I can tell you for certain that Stanbic IBTC equity fund and ARM discovery fund have out performed the Nigerian All share index on several occasions even during the stock market meltdown. You can goggle it to confirm my claim.

As indicated in my earlier post, investing in mutual funds has its pros and cons but giving the whole investment a bad name is not appropriate especially for uninformed investors. I have consistently invested in a mutual fund as part of my entire portfolio for over five years and the returns (dividend payout and capital appreciation) has outperformed the NSE all share index.

Also not every body can analyse and take investment decisions regarding equities.

I keep telling people that the inflation rate we use in Nigeria is very flawed especially when we are all aware that data used to compute it is not accurate. The rate of inflation should be determined by a combination of consumer index, balance of trade payments,LIBOR etc and not the apex bank unilaterally setting it.

Finally go through my post again and you will note that I have include "continuous learning" as a criteria for the investment curve to be complete and YES one needs to invest long term in a good and tested mutual fund albeit in small tranches if a sustainable ROI is to be achieved.

I rest my case!

oluks05: Am surprised about some of d response here. I have been investing in d ARM aggressive growth fund for over 2 yrs now and I have never had any issues with them, in fact I have been impressed dat I plan to even opt my monthly contribution. Am investing for d long term @ least 15yrs so never made any attempt to withdraw/sell. For those saying mutual funds investment is for lazy ppl dat is so not true some of us jst don't have dat time or perhaps interest to monitor stocks. I for sure like am sure many odas too do educate my self and finance/investing but I doubt I have d time for d type of dedication investing in stocks wld demand and ARM does d job for me.

manie:



I don't do mutual funds, but my returns by investing over the years on the stock market has consistently given me a better returns than the mutual funds highlighted by you.
Rather than buying mutual fund, I will advice starters to invest in index fund, 95% of mutual funds in Nigeria are out to short change investors.

deenee: @ manie.....I can tell you for certain that Stanbic IBTC equity fund and ARM discovery fund have out performed the Nigerian All share index on several occasions even during the stock market meltdown. You can goggle it to confirm my claim.

As indicated in my earlier post, investing in mutual funds has its pros and cons but giving the whole investment a bad name is not appropriate especially for uninformed investors. I have consistently invested in a mutual fund as part of my entire portfolio for over five years and the returns (dividend payout and capital appreciation) has outperformed the NSE all share index.

Also not every body can analyse and take investment decisions regarding equities.

I keep telling people that the inflation rate we use in Nigeria is very flawed especially when we are all aware that data used to compute it is not accurate. The rate of inflation should be determined by a combination of consumer index, balance of trade payments,LIBOR etc and not the apex bank unilaterally setting it.

Finally go through my post again and you will note that I have include "continuous learning" as a criteria for the investment curve to be complete and YES one needs to invest long term in a good and tested mutual fund albeit in small tranches if a sustainable ROI is to be achieved.

I rest my case!

Nosyke:

You are very right bros, more like ponzi scheme.

I invested in Intercontinental funds in 2010, there is no increment whatsoever.
Now they ve changed to ACAP or so. They deliberately made almost impossible to sell.
I called them that I want to sell mine, they said I should come to Lagos (from Abuja) to come and collect my original certificate, (that they caant send it via mail and I can't authorise some other person to collect for me).

@ Op, if you have money you can use it to buy land and keep, its surely better than fund

Kennyfancy: Pls who hav ARM official website, pls i would lov to go through it

okpaniokpani: I invested my money in Zenith Equity Mutual Fund for about four(4) years. The fund was never listed on the NSE,activities of the fund were shrouded in secrecy to say the least.
I never got any dividend within these years. I sold out and never looked back. I will never advice any one to buy into any mutual fund in Nigeria. They are greedy bunch of people.

Bobbysworld28: I've bn using firstbank's fixed income & mutual funds since last year & no regrets.
But seriously, u guys r scaring me

carpenter:
http://www.arm.com.ng/

http://www.arm.com.ng/

oluks05:
Am surprised about some of d response here. I have been investing in d ARM aggressive growth fund for over 2 yrs now and I have never had any issues with them, in fact I have been impressed dat I plan to even opt my monthly contribution. Am investing for d long term @ least 15yrs so never made any attempt to withdraw/sell. For those saying mutual funds investment is for lazy ppl dat is so not true some of us jst don't have dat time or perhaps interest to monitor stocks. I for sure like am sure many odas too do educate my self and finance/investing but I doubt I have d time for d type of dedication investing in stocks wld demand and ARM does d job for me.