- BSE unveils new 5 year strategy
- BSE to offer investors more diversified products
The Botswana Stock Exchange (BSE) unveiled its new five-year strategy (2022-2026) that is aimed at positioning it as the preferred destination for issuers and investors by offering diversified products and services while leveraging on technology, innovation, relationships, proficiencies and subscribing to effective and efficient processes.
BSE intends to achieve this Strategic Intent by pursuing specific goals, among them improving its proficiency and overall financial performance to support its stature as a for profit entity. To achieve this, the organisation says it requires diversified income streams, efficient cost management and the prevalence of a high performance culture where staff members adapt themselves as stakeholders in the company.
The BSE also intends to develop robust strategic initiatives to attract and retain issuers, investors and products. This goal will be measured using the ratio of Domestic Market Capitalisation to Gross Domestic Product as well as the Number of Listed Securities.
The BSE wants to leverage technology, innovation and processes to increase market activity and liquidity, leading to increased numbers of issuers, investors, products, diversity of the investor base and listed products, as well as improved levels of engagement by intermediaries/brokers, improved levels of awareness and literacy by the investor base. This goal will be measured by the average daily turnover in listed products.
The BSE will also create an environment that promotes the competitiveness of the domestic capital market in relation to peer markets in order to support its growth ambitions. This will be achieved through establishment of regulatory frameworks and continual review in order to foster an environment conducive for attracting new issuers, investors and asset classes. This goal will be measured by the number of issuers.
The four key goals of the Strategic Intent are expected to support the Vision of the BSE, which is “To Be a World Class Securities Exchange Delivering Innovative Products and Services.” The new strategy carries off from the 2017-2021 plan which was implemented on the backdrop of a slowdown in domestic economic performance, increasing regulatory requirements and reduced global sentiment in respect of the attractiveness of the domestic investment landscape.
The latter years of the strategic plan (2020 and 2021) were characterised by the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic and concomitant containment measures, which impacted the overall business environment in Botswana. These developments have significantly impacted the capital market landscape with respect to the issuances, investor participation and the rollout of some of the activities entailed in the plan.
Thus BSE says this backdrop has played an influential part in determining the extent of the completion and achievement of the five-year Strategic Plan, the pace of achieving the set annual initiatives and the cost of implementing the Strategic Plan. On an annual and half-yearly basis, the BSE says it assesses its performance using the Balanced Scorecard methodology and reports the performance to the Board. A review of the Balanced Scorecards for the years 2017 to 2021 indicates that company has achieved a larger portion of its objectives and managed to deliver most of its strategic initiatives over the past five years.
The BSE says this observation is corroborated by analysis conducted by specialists and the feedback from consultations with the Board of Directors of the CSDB and the BSE. But despite the efforts deployed in undertaking the initiatives, the company says it experienced setbacks emanating mainly from the systemic environment. These have impacted the forecast in terms of listed securities with a knock-on effect on the overall market liquidity. Nevertheless, the BSE says its financial performance continued to improve, noting that its overall performance during the 2017-2021 strategy period amounted to achievement of 91 percent.
