Chengetedzai hunts for unclaimed shares’ owners

Chengetedzai Depository Company (CDC) says individuals hold the largest number and proportion of accounts on its Central Securities Depository (CSD) while the other large portion of CSD accounts falls under the unclaimed shares.

In a CSD update for September 2022, CEO of the firm, Prosper Mutorogodo, said the company has since gone on the market to identify the shares’ owners.

“This has prompted the CSD to go on a market drive where efforts have been increased to identify those making up the unclaimed shares category so that they claim their shares,” he said.

Mutorogodo said securities registered on the CDC CSD accounted for 42,56 percent of total market capitalisation for dematerialized shares, and their total value for the period was $774,168 billion.

“This is expected to increase given the sustained marketing campaign by CDC to attract new listings on the Zimbabwe Stock Exchange (ZSE).”

In terms of distribution of market values by account class, the investor category that holds the most significant value on CDC CSD is corporates and pension funds which account for 34,68 percent and 22,91 percent respectively.

During the month under review, a total of 181 equities deposits were processed and this brought the cumulative number of deposits since going live to 103,030.

Mutorogodo said CDC continues on a dematerialisation campaign to increase the demat ratio in 2022 for individuals and institutional investors still holding shares in physical form.

“The average Dematerialisation penetration ratio (Demat Ratio) across all counters was at 56,04 as at 30 September 2022 with 18 counters above the 70 percent threshold,” he said.

He noted that cumulative number of trades processed in 2022 closed at 69,241.

In September 6,095 trades were processed on the CDC CSD, valued at $6,695 billion.

During the month under review, the ZSE equities market capitalisation decreased by 7,92 percent for September 2022, closing at $1,819 trillion.

The total turnover for trades on the Zimbabwe Stock Exchange settling through CDC CSD was $3,518 billion for the month under review.

The CDC CSD opened 560 new accounts in September 2022, resulting in 5,189 accounts being opened this year to date.

“As a result, the cumulative number of accounts opened on the CDC CSD as of 30 September 2022 was 43,143,” he said.

Local investors accounted for 95,07 percent and foreign investors accounted for 4,93 percent of all accounts opened on the CDC CSD.-ebusinessweekly