Investment 101 (Live Q&A Session)

Added: 2026-05-30

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[00:03:28]Thank you very much. My next >> How has today been so far?

[00:03:32]>> Yeah, it's been all right. Um, I've had a good trading day today, so I'm grateful.

[00:03:38]>> I mean, I just hope that nobody's house is flooded because of the rain.

[00:03:41]>> Yeah. Yeah. And that too. And that >> audience we are audible enough. Kindly give us a thumbs up.

[00:03:56]Okay. That's great.

[00:04:02]All right. I see thumbs up means we are enough. Everybody can hear us. So we can jump in into today's session. It's going to be a Q&A session. We are going to ask a number of questions and our experts here are going to assist us to explain, give examples and then also site scenarios to help you better understand the investment landscape of Ghana and the opportunities you have available to use and then also enough knowledge to make investment decisions especially when it comes to stock trading. given the kind of feedback that we've received from you our clients and then also investors in the past. So gentlemen is >> Yes sir.

[00:04:48]>> How are you?

[00:04:48]>> I'm doing well. How are you?

[00:04:50]>> Great. I'm also very welcome. You tell us what asset management is all about and what a typical day of a portfolio manager looks like.

[00:04:59]>> Okay. So asset management is about um managing investors assets by way of money and making sure that they get um a certain amount of return at the end of the investment period. Um it doesn't just it's not just money but you can also look at the client's overall assets. So maybe they have some real estate, they have um commodities across board. You want to make sure that the client is making money on whichever assets that they have. um day-to-day just portfolio structuring um speaking to client trying to understand what they want to achieve with their investments, how much they are willing, how long they are willing to go and yeah those are the basics but also ensuring that our portfolios are also giving the level of return that we expect and we promised our investors. Yeah.

[00:05:46]>> Yes sir.

[00:05:47]>> How are you too?

[00:05:48]>> I'm doing well.

[00:05:48]>> How been so far?

[00:05:50]>> Yeah, like I said earlier um I've had a good trading day so I can't complain.

[00:05:54]Yeah, it's been okay.

[00:05:56]>> Yes, I have.

[00:06:00]>> Okay. So, a typical day for a trader basically starts with looking at what has happened previously in the market, taking um market information, taking economic data that is going to affect prices of securities that have been traded. Um secondly, I'll be calling my clients and Emanuel here is one of my clients. So by Emanuel I mean speaking to fund managers, speaking to other financial institutions, speaking to banks to get flows from them on a daily basis. People are buying and selling securities based on whatever their projections are. So I'm speaking to buyers, I'm speaking to sellers and I'm just the middleman and I bring them together to get the trade done.

[00:06:38]>> Thank you. Thank you.

[00:06:41]You can help us understand the difference between savings and investment. Okay, I think that that's one of the um most misunderstood concepts in the in our in our space.

[00:06:54]Savings is you putting money away and um taking it out you want to. Investment is making that money work for you. So investment will be an extension of savings because you have to have the money and that money has to grow. So savings is more of low risk. Your money is probably with a bank. Anytime you want that money, you just go to the bank and you take that money out. no risk and no returns to some extent. Maybe some banks can promise you um 0.1% a full year return and really that's that's that's chicken change. So you have to take a step forward and say that okay um instead of saving my money I'll let my money work for me as I sleep. So that's taking a step forward, putting that money to use by investing that money whether in whichever asset you're thinking about whether in the equity market, whether in the money market, fixed income market, commodities, um crypto, any how you want to want to put it to work. Yeah.

[00:07:50]>> Investment for rich people.

[00:07:52]>> Oh, how no I think I think investment is for everybody.

[00:07:56]>> Yeah.

[00:07:56]>> Um I think the misconception has been that um you you are waiting for some amount of money. You're waiting for >> a lump sum. lump sum bulk money to invest but that's not how it's done. We say the best time to invest was yesterday and the next best time is today. So even if you start small small by the end of maybe 10 years 20 years and the work that we've done means that it it's compounding is also one of the effects that help in investing. So if you start small small the money grows for you rather than wait to get the that bulk amount and remember that as you wait for the bulk amount inflation is also eating away some of that money.

[00:08:30]Yeah. So those are some of the things that you'd want to take care when you're doing.

[00:08:35]>> Yes sir.

[00:08:39]>> Investment become different from gamb.

[00:08:43]>> Okay. All right. That's a good question.

[00:08:45]Um I'll say when you are looking to invest you have one a clear strategy.

[00:08:51]Number two, you have research at your disposal. And number three, you have taken into account all the risk and the possibilities of the outcome of the investment. But when you are when you start gambling, there there's a very thin line between investing and gambling. When you start gambling now, you'll be using speculation. You'll be trading based on emotion. You'll be trading based on hearsay and you'll be trading based on what you think an outcome should be, which is not always what the market is representative of. So bet way is not investment though way is not investment. You can't prove the outcome. You cannot prove the outcome at all. You cannot predict the outcome.

[00:09:29]>> So if you telling us that way is not an investment. Can you just walk us through the difference between fixed income securities as an asset class and also equities.

[00:09:38]>> Okay. All right. So I like to look at it in this way. Um fixed income we should take note of what the word is fixed and income. Now fixed income basically means that um it is an investment instrument that gives you a fixed return at every point in time. But equity means that you are a part holder of the company or you're a part owner of the company. So basically that is it.

[00:10:05]>> Income is sharing of the fixed return.

[00:10:08]Equity does not assure me of >> Yes. But then your your returns will be in terms of dividend payments and capital gains. And I'm sure we'll get there. Yeah.

[00:10:19]stocks, shares. Can we use them interchangeably?

[00:10:22]>> Yes, we can. Those three things mean the same thing. Those three words to fix income, I just want to return to you. We've been hearing about collective investment schemes, mutual. What are the what are the types available on the Ghanaian market?

[00:10:39]>> Okay. Um, so as the name goes, collective investment schemes. So it's it's when funds are put together. So say Michael and I we have he has 100 cities, I have 100 cities.

[00:10:51]>> We don't have any 10 million. Okay.

[00:10:55]>> We don't have the expertise to manage that money. So maybe we want to do stocks but we can't pick and choose stocks on our own.

[00:11:02]>> So we give we pull that money together.

[00:11:04]We give to a certain fund manager and tell the fund manager that manage this money for us at the end of the year.

[00:11:09]report to us and tell us what it has done and then we pay you a certain amount of money which is um management fees right which is usually a percentage of the assets that are under management.

[00:11:20]>> So that is collective investment. So it's not it's not very technical it's just people different people coming together yeah money together and saying that they're g to a farm manager to manage for them. Locally we have um there are balance funds. balance fund essentially are um funds that look at fixed income securities and stocks and blend them in one portfolio. We have fixed income instrument fixed income mutual funds or unit trusts that do just the fixed income portion of the market and then we have money market which is looking at near cash instruments. So like treasury bills, fixed deposits, repos and all that. We have that section as well. And we have pure equity funds in by extension there's also REITs which is real estate investment trust which is um also pool of funds but investing in real estate. So there's also that. So mutual funds and unit trust come in different shapes and forms depending on what the manager is trying to do. So if you have a manager who is looking to like us enhance equity beta looking at technology stocks that's the main objective of the fund and so if you as an investor want to play in that space you can invest in enhanced equity beta if you're looking at REITs there are other REIT instruments or mutual funds on the market that you can also um tap into. So across board the market is broad in terms of mutual funds. If you don't know how to pick and choose the stocks on your own just try the fund manager to do that work for you.

[00:12:49]Okay. So in house we have six mutual funds. Um I'll take them by level of risk >> lowest to the highest. So by lowest we have um plus income fund and fixed income for plus that targets the money market space in Ghana. So, treasury bills, repos, um fixed deposits, um and those short-term instrument just make sure that we are we have enhanced liquidity such that if you want to take your money out at any time, we able to give you that money. And it also helps for clients who are who have short-term goals because you want to you want to pay rent in two months and you have the money now >> and you want that money to grow a bit for you. So you you put that money there and then it maybe gives you like 1% return at the end of that two months period and then you take better which is better than nothing really which is better than savings keeping it in the bank right so the that six income alpha plus and plus income address that space then when we come outside of that we also have delta fund which is our dollar liquidity fund so that predominantly looks at um US treasuries investment grade um instrument so that is that invest um most of it assets in USD. So it gives you some level of USD return as well.

[00:14:04]Then we also move to the highly risky side where we have plus balance fund which is one our balance fund that has a mix of fixed income instruments and equity instruments blended together. We call it the salad because it has everything in there. Local stocks, international stock, local fixed income, international fixed income, commodity looking at gold, we have REIT in there.

[00:14:24]So it's a blend of all the asset classes. So it's the it's the salads.

[00:14:29]Yeah. Ghana salads. Then we have the equity funds Christian committee mutual fund and enhanced equity beta fund.

[00:14:35]Christian committee mutual fund looks at broad market exposure in the US. So equity equity securities in the US market. So trump the S&P 500 which is the 500 of the largest companies in the US.

[00:14:48]>> Enhance equity meter does global tech stocks. So it is not just focused on US but global tech stocks in um in the in the global market. So you find names like um Alibaba in there, Tencent, you find uh Amazon, Tesla and all that. So it's a blend of everything. So it's looking at global stocks, global tech um as as as an asset class and investing in there. And as I mentioned, I started from a scale of lowest risk to highest risk. That should tell you that enhanced equity beta has a very high risk profile and so it's usually ideal for long-term goals like retirement uh nest of paying accounts uh those those type of goals. So you you want to plan for your your kids college the next 20 years. Those are some of the portfolios that you want to invest in.

[00:15:38]And if you're looking at short-term goals also you're looking at plus income fund you're looking at fixed income alpha plus. Um so those are those are the blends of uh uh mutual funds in house. So you can look at them and say that okay I have a portfolio I don't want too much I I want to risk but I don't want too much exposure to the US market. So how do I do it? Then you say that okay with that 100 100k that I have maybe I'll do 50k in fixed income alpha plus and I'll do 50k in CCMF or EBF to give you that balance of capital growth and also give you that capital preservation. So that's how we look at investment in general.

[00:16:11]>> I just need a single word answer for this. Are you saying that I can be an investor in Ghana and still have an exposure outside of Ghana?

[00:16:19]>> Yes sir, you can.

[00:16:20]>> Okay. We've also heard about exchange traded funds, ETFs, right? What are they?

[00:16:26]>> Okay, so ETFs are quite similar to how mutual funds and um unit trust operate.

[00:16:34]The only addition is that they are listed on an exchange. So you find um they work just the same with by structure. They are just the same. They are all collective investment schemes but this is extended onto an exchange so that you can also buy and trade them on an exchange locally. We have one um ETF on the market new gold ETF which is a commodity ETF. So um once you buy that you you've essentially have exposure to the um to the gold market. So that is how that also plays out in terms of I don't know Michael is the new gold actively traded?

[00:17:11]>> Yes, it's actively traded. I mean um back then say 3 four 5 years ago it wasn't much that people were looking at but I think after the DD it opened people's eyes onto diversification started yes they started looking at other options available and aside that to when there were the conversations of Russia Ukraine war people were running to look for safety was just >> yes and gold was just going up so people sat there was like ah we have this ETF on our market and it it's not something that people are investing in. So I think after we started seeing more traction >> was in 2018.

[00:17:47]>> Yes. Yes. It's been a while. It's been it was relative when you look at the chart it was quite flat for a while until people started diversifying and you see the upward appreciation and price.

[00:17:59]>> So that's Ghanaity market.

[00:18:08]>> Okay. So on Ghana's commodity market and let me begin from here. Now for Ghanaian investors the conversation is usually on um fixed income and equity. Even on the equity people don't understand it too well. People are generally looking at fixed income. Now the commodity is an extension of other alternative investments that we should have in the market. And um thankfully the commodity section was established in 2018 and we have begun to see some traction in there. Myself I have I can proudly say that I have traded on the commodities exchange before. H I bought some sodium for a client of ours and yeah I just believe that there is more room for improvement when it comes to the education that the commission would be giving out to investors to see what the appetite is because we're not seeing traction. We're not seeing a lot of traction when it came to um the equity market a few years back when we go back but now we can see how the equity market has builded itself up and we can see the movement in um what do I say is it's moving in an upward trajectory. Yeah.

[00:19:20]>> That's good for farmers right >> yes yes market for their produce.

[00:19:25]>> Yes. Yes. Basically already we've heard some jargon and some terminologies within the market. People often hear money market and capital markets and immediately they get confused. Can you help us appreciate what the differences are and some of the securities that fall within these asset class.

[00:19:44]>> Okay. So money market is basically a short-term market, right? So this is a market where um individuals and institutions borrow and lend money in a very short term and when I say short term we are looking at between overnight investment even up onto a year but when we say the capital market this is where investors and institutions are looking at long-term capital that is going to be used for businesses growth uh businesses um reinvestment that is going to look at whether they are going to more research and development and with that you cannot do that within 3 months, 6 months, a year. It is going to take time. So simply put money market is a market where very short-term investment is done up to a year and the capital market is where um investments are done from a year and beyond. So example of money markets will be um fixed deposits um treasury bills 91D that's is 3 months 182 day that's 6 months and 364 day that is one year then when we see capital market we are seeing the shares that we are talking about and we are also seeing bonds that are issued say 3 years 5 years 7 year and beyond.

[00:21:00]Okay. On bonds. So if a bond is issued for let's say 5 years and it travels through time and it has just about one year to maturity, would it qualify as a money market instrument?

[00:21:12]>> Yes, it becomes a money market instrument because you are looking at the tenor of of the security year to to maturity.

[00:21:20]>> Okay. In that case, would it be fair to say the money market protects well while the capital market grows well?

[00:21:29]>> Yes. We can we can put it that way. Um really because um in the in the short term the risk of losing your money short is is almost almost not there.

[00:21:41]>> Yeah. Not >> um >> in the if you if you if you go into the longer term then you risk losing money.

[00:21:48]Yeah. Right. So if you enter the equity space equities are by their nature they are more risky compared to maybe a treasury bill >> and volatile >> and volatile. So you'd want to play play it safe if your if your money is not longterm. You want to stay safe on the money market side. Yeah.

[00:22:04]>> All right. Thank you very much my panelists for your explanation so far.

[00:22:09]At this point I want to delve into the stock market just a little bit.

[00:22:14]>> Um in the last six months we've had about three IPOs. Uh we've had first Atlantic Bank list then Ghana has also listed and then now we have Kasap which is an ongoing IPO.

[00:22:28]>> What is an IPO Michael?

[00:22:29]>> And what happens during an IPO?

[00:22:32]>> So an IPO the is is an abbreviation. It means initial public offer IPO. So it basically means that a company is looking for financing. Now there are two ways of financing a company through debt and through equity. Through debt is they go to banks or institutions and they borrow money from them and then they they promise to pay or they under obligation to pay some fixed um amount of interest on a monthly basis or whatever the agreement is. And then there's the equity financing where they go to the same investors or firms or individuals and ask for money or raise capital from them and issue shares onto them. So when you give them um your money that is the company, they are going to give you a number of shares based on the valuation that they have done. So an IPO basically means that the money is moving from the the individuals or the investors or the firms direct right and that is quite different from what happens on the secondary market because after an IPO and the shares are listed on the stock exchange then that movement of cash that is the buying and selling of the shares is done between investors that are on the stock exchange and it has nothing to do with the company that has already issued the shares. Yeah.

[00:23:54]Market first.

[00:23:56]>> Yes. Market would be like the second floor.

[00:23:59]>> Yes. Yes.

[00:24:00]>> So on the primary market, you'd be giving money directly to the issuer.

[00:24:04]>> Yes.

[00:24:04]>> But when it moves to the secondary market, it's between and among investors.

[00:24:08]>> Yes. Exactly.

[00:24:09]>> Okay. Thank you very much for that explanation. So Iman is let's say a company is coming to the market for the very first time. That is the primary market, right? It could be an IPO. could be a bond, an IPO, or even a credit bill being issued. As an asset manager, a portfolio manager, what do you think investors should look at first before rushing into let's say buy a company or participate in an IPO?

[00:24:38]>> Okay. Um there are a few things that you really need to look at, which is um one key thing is the financials of the company. Whether the company is in good financial health that's the key thing because you're investing you're investing for a certain amount of return or you're investing because the company is planning to make a certain amount of revenue. Yeah.

[00:24:56]>> So and that revenue as an because you become a shareholder an owner you partake in that revenue through capital gain or through dividend. So you should be interested in that first. Yes.

[00:25:06]>> So once you have that then you also look at whether the company has a good corporate structure. So in terms of >> do they have a board?

[00:25:13]>> Yes. And the directors the director.

[00:25:15]Yeah, the directors on the board whether they have the financial capacity, they have the knowledge, they have the expertise and all that to to be on that board because you can't you can't find that you are investing in a company that works that is a bank and then the the expertise are in farming. The board's expertise is in farming.

[00:25:32]>> You want to make sure that there's a a good match between the board's expertise and then what the company does so that they can advise management of that company. So those are some of the things you need to also look at. They also look at what the forecast is. What I have I've come to understand is that we we buy companies because of a certain amount of expected return. We expecting a company to also make a certain amount of revenue going forward or perform a certain way. So you have to look at what the company is also forecasting to do and you also make assumptions to say that okay they said this but what what does it really mean? What can they really achieve on the ground if we are supposed to forecast that um revenue and cash flow things. So it's import.

[00:26:19]No, that would be a big mistake. Try to understand it before you go in.

[00:26:33]>> Showing up spending.

[00:26:34]>> Yeah.

[00:26:35]>> When is it going to be executed?

[00:26:37]>> Okay. So Kasa Pre came to the market and said that they have they have a one month offer period. That one month offer period means that they taking they accepting bits but say that >> commit whether you can you want to do it. So that one month period means that they have not actually given you the shares.

[00:26:53]>> They've only said that come and show interest in buying.

[00:26:57]>> So you putting in the order on that means that you are making an offer that you want you're making a pitch that you want to buy. Right. The offer ends I think on Monday but actual issuance or allotment of the security will be I think 14th or 15th. Yes. Right. So that's when that security becomes yours.

[00:27:16]Yeah.

[00:27:16]>> Currently. So your money will be taken and then that key to be issued to you currently. What they doing is that they're taking they're just accepting bits on the market. So there's the shares actually haven't been issued. So once they issued or allotted uh by 15 that's when it be listed on the market.

[00:27:32]then you have the actual shares um for yourself. Yeah.

[00:27:36]>> All right. Thank you very much. So what it means is that until the upper thread comes to an end going to show us 10.

[00:27:44]>> Yes. Because I mean at a point you don't know whether it is going to be overs subscribed under subscribed and if it's over subscribed there are measures to be able to see who they are going to give their sh whether it's by first time first basis or by a patter that they they're looking at your size and saying that this is the total. So instead of giving you 100% of your bid they're giving you 50% of your bid.

[00:28:06]Yeah, that's that's really how >> it was going to be first come first serve because if I subscribed let's say in the early weeks of the offer and Michael here wait till the very last day to subscribe why don't I get priority >> oh I mean that's that's really on the the company issuing the bonds and their board and whatever they decide to do right um it's I I I think that I understand that point of view right so it would be unfair because for some institutions they have to get approvals from Yeah.

[00:28:36]>> Well, they're beneficiary owners and it takes a while to get that approval. So, if you do first come first, first come first serve, then you may disadvantage some people and maybe people are actually even waiting for their salaries to hit at the end of the month so that they can.

[00:28:51]So, if you do first come first serve, you are you're disadvantaging some people. Yeah.

[00:28:55]>> All right. Thank you. Let me remind our audience that we are live on Facebook, YouTube and then also on Tik Tok, >> right? So you can follow us here if you join us on team as well and just let us have your questions and then after we done all the questions we have here we're also going to turn our attention your questions I have here with me and also humanist my name is just give us 30 seconds we'll be right Relax.

[00:29:54]Woo!

[00:29:58]Heat.

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