Thursday 5 June 2014

THE BASIC RESPONSIBILITIES OF THE INVESTOR RELATIONS UNIT OF A QUOTED COMPANY

INTRODUCTION

 A Company’s Investor Relations Structure and Activity Chart should include the guiding philosophy, the roles and responsibilities, the activities as well the deliverables of the unit in support of the Company’s corporate goals.

GUIDING PHILOSOPHY

The Investor Relations Unit serves to handle Investor related issues, manage market expectations and release information required for investment judgment suitable to the stockholder or the Investor in order to improve The Company’s market value thereby engendering sustainable superior returns to Shareholders.


POLICIES – CREATING A PLATFORM FOR VALUE ENHANCEMENT

The unit shall in alignment with its guiding philosophy develop the following policies and plans to guide its operations:

·         Disclosure policy.

·         Definition of "material Information".

·         Deciding who will be the company spokesperson.

·         Disaster plan.

·         Annual and quarterly report preparation policy.

·         Analyst policy and media contact list from the Capital Market Correspondents Association of Nigeria (CAMCAN).

·         Appropriateness of advertising.

·         Informing employees of stock movement or participation in stock plan.

·         Creating or enhancing mailing lists of target audience.

 
GOALS AND OBJECTIVES

·         Increase visibility in the financial community

·         Decrease stock price volatility

·         Make a public offering of stock

·         Increase percent of stock owned by institutional investors or employees

·         Attracting new or more analysts to cover the company.


STRUCTURE AND ACTIVITY CHART

ROLES AND RESPONSIBILITIES


  1. Maintain Shareholder Register

Liaise with Registrars on updates to Shareholder Register

    • The unit will on a Monthly basis request a current list of the Company’s Shareholders from the Company’s Registrars.
    • This list will contain the names of the Company’s current Investors and their holding.
    • Upon receipt of the list, the unit will proceed to upgrade its register and furnish the Company’s Management with same.
    • The list where possible will contain current addresses of the Company’s shareholders.

  1. Attend to Shareholders complaint and enquires
Keep a Register of complaints, letters, etc. Liaise with Registrars to handle issues of reconciliation, Share Certificate issuance and unclaimed Dividend and Certificate

    • The Unit will upon receipt of Investor complaint, register such complaint in a register.
    • The register will among other things record the following:

-       Name and contact of Investor

-       Nature of complaint

-       Date filed

-       Status

-       Action taken

-       Resolution

    • Having recorded the complaint, the department will proceed to resolving the complaint.
    • Where the complaint is related to missing share certificates and a request for a re-issue, the following steps shall be taken:

-       The complainant shall be given a standard affidavit format on which he is expected to depose in a court of law and return the hard copy of same to the unit for further processing

-       Upon receipt of the sworn-affidavit, the unit will do a photocopy of the affidavit and then forward the original copy with a letter to the Company’s Registrars

-       The Complainant shall be re-issued a Certificate by The Company’s Registrars within 72 hours of the receipt of the affidavit and the same certificate shall be dispatched to the Complainant within 24 hours of the receipt of re-issued certificate by the unit

    • Where the complaint is related to errors in name or address printed on the certificate or units of shares subscribed to, the following steps shall be taken:

-       The complainant will be requested to do a letter to the unit   

      stating the correct name, address or unit of shares

      originally subscribed to

-       A covering letter will be attached to the complainant’s letter and both shall be forwarded to the Registrars for processing.

-       The necessary corrections and dispatch of corrected certificate shall be done within 72 hours of the forwarding of the certificate to the Registrars

 
  1. Handle Director’s Shareholding issues

    • The unit shall, as directed by Management, deal on Director related issues. 

  1. Keep records of exceptional transactions relating to Share movement.
    • The unit shall liaison with the Corporate Finance unit keep track of exceptional transactions relating to the Company’s share movement
    • And shall immediately notify Management of such exceptional transactions

  1. Track the quantity of Shares traded on daily basis as well as the Share-price
    • The unit shall generate report on traded Shares fortnightly
    • The unit shall do this through monitoring of stocks traded daily as well as the price
    • The unit shall also prepare Quarterly Share-range Analysis.

  1. Edit monthly Investors Digest

    • The unit shall gather, edit and publish Investor related news and information on a monthly basis

  1. Stock Exchange Liaison

    • The unit shall in liaise with the Stock Exchange on behalf of the Company and as directed by Management.
 

  1. Organization of Road-shows, Fact-behind the figure, Stock-brokers and Investors Forum

    • The unit shall as directed by Management convene forums that help to help to improve the visibility and investment appeal of the Company. 

  1. Organization of AGM, Board and other statutory meetings

 

    • The unit shall organize the Company’s investors gatherings such as Board Meetings and AGM’s


  1. Publication of Annual Financial Reports and Accounts

    • The Unit shall, working closely with the Financial Control and Legal Units publish the Annual Financial Reports and Account.

CALENDAR AND ACTIVITIES

  • Look out for HNI’s and Institutional Investors who presently have little shares and delight them through responsiveness to complaints and release of timely information.

-       Publication of Monthly Investors Digest

-       Quarterly letter to these group of Investors by the CEO and Company Secretary intimating them of the activities of the Company and leaving a line for response and suggestions

-       To boost interaction, the unit shall mine data on their business, family and birthday using a structured questionnaire