MERISTEM Securities Limited has launched a new trading platform adjudged as ‘Nigeria’s first naira multi derivative assets platform – MeriFX. With the new trading platform, one can now trade Forex, Commodities, Indices and Equities all from one trading account in Naira.

Speaking at the launch of the product, the Managing Director, Meristem Stockbrockers Ltd, Mrs. Gbadunola Sokunbi noted that “MeriFX offers you the chance to trade the world’s most popular financial markets at your fingertips.”
“But the catch is that you are not really trading (buying or selling) anything that you can own, but merely engaging in something called ‘spread betting’. Unlike stocks whereby you own a piece of a company when you buy, when you spread bet, you are only speculating on the price movements of thousands of global financial markets including indices, shares, currencies, commodities and more”.

According to Sokunbi, “You can use spread bets to speculate on price movements irrespective of whether the markets are rising or falling. If you go long (buy), your profits will rise in line with any increase in that price. If you go short (sell), your profits will rise in line with any fall. Similarly, if you go long on the price and the underlying stock price falls, you will incur losses.
“The minimum trade size on MeriFX is $200 or N40, 000”, she added.

Analysing the unique features of the platform, the guest speaker, Mr. Mathew Smith of FINSA Europe Ltd noted that the platform provides inexperienced traders a platform to test the waters with the MeriFX demo account, which is a dummy of the real platform. This he said, safeguard inexperienced traders from running into ditches in the real process.

Meristem Securities Limited in 2014 inaugurated an online stock-trading platform aimed at fostering market participation. According to the firm, the platform, called Meritrade, serve as a virtual stockbroking platform, helping users to always trade stocks on the Nigerian Stock Exchange from anywhere in the world through their computers or mobile phones.

The Chief Executive Officer, Nigeria Stock Exchange, Oscar Onyema, speaking said the product was an innovation which was in line with the Exchange’s strategy for developing and protecting the Nigerian capital market.

Onyema then said that, apart from providing a convenient mode of trading equities, the online platform, Meritrade, would encourage more people to participate in the stock market. “This position is rooted on the realisation that the securities industry is largely powered by technology,” he said.