Gov’t must tread with caution in listing SoEs on stock market – Financial Analyst

Financial analyst and Financial Advisory Partner, Deloitte Africa, Yaw Appiah-Lartey has advised the government to tread with caution with any move in listing State-Owned Enterprises on the Stock Market.

According to him, even if the government is convinced on the move it should be on a case to case basis of which State-Owned Enterprises should be listed.

Minister for Public Enterprises, Joseph Cudjoe in his recent public engagement has disclosed that the government is considering listing some five State-owned Enterprises on the Stock Market.

He further said that the Cabinet will soon decide the fate of some 17 state-owned enterprises who he says are currently liabilities to the country as the government is only incurring costs by keeping them active.

Commenting on the development on Starr Today with Joshua Kodjo Mensah, the Financial Advisory Partner to Deloitte Africa said before the government should embark on that it should also consider what investors will be interested in.

“It’s a good idea but the only caution I will put out there is that we should tread cautiously and then look at the timing of the listing. You notice that in the last two years we haven’t had any major listing up after the recent listing. Why, because when the macro indicators are not very strong you will have very little interest in stock exchange so currently. As we are speaking people are not investing in the equity market so if you go and list on the stock exchange subscription will be very low.

“But if the economy gets back on track there is strong interest and there are a lot of activities on the equities market that is when you do the list. So I think it’s about timing. We have to go to the market at the right time. We also have to assess on a case by case basis,” Mr. Appiah Lartey stated.

He continued: “There are some that may have a successful list because of the interest from the public and the kind of product we are offering. There are others that will have challenges. So we have to access them on a case by case basis. That is something that will buy the interest of traditional and individual investors in Ghana.”