Before you can become active in the stock market, you would by all means need to engage the services of a stock broker. This is because they are certified individuals that carry out stock orders on behalf of investors like you and I. So, how do you go about it?

1. Take time to ask friends and family members you know are active investors. Ask them to rate their current stock broker/ stock broking firm and their services. Be particular about the individual that manages their accounts and executes their orders (this is because you can have a good stock broking firm, but the account officer is not efficient).

If you do not have a relation that is an active investor, then you can get a list of stock broking firms in your neighbor hood ( a list is provided for you on this site) and place a call. It is important you contact them so as to know their requirements for opening an account, especially with respect to cash. Some firms open with as low as N10,000 while some start with minimum of N1,000,000 .

2. Once you have gotten all the requirements, proceed to the broking firm on the agreed date with all the requirements. You will be given some forms to fill in your personal details. Most likely, you will be given a company form and a CSCS form.

The company form is for the company to have your records as a customer. The CSCS form on the other hand is for the company to process a CSCS account for you. The CSCS account is an e-account that would contain all your stock transactions. Opening the CSCS account would also entitle you to receive alerts on your mobile phone whenever there is a transaction on your shares.

3. Once you have filled the form, ask for the account number(s) of the company. This is so that you can pay in money when ever you want to buy shares. Normally, the CSCS account takes about a week to be opened. Once this is done, you will be alerted on your phone of this and then you can begin active investment.

If you have bought public offers in the past and have your certificates, ensure you immediately take them for verification on the CSCS and company accounts have been opened. Most preferably, use stock broking firm with online websites. This is so that you can also keep tack of your investments from anywhere in the world even if you cannot get text messages.

This entry was posted on Monday, March 23rd, 2009 at 12:21 pm and is filed under StockMarketNigeria. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Tags: ApprovedO
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