What is the AELP and why it matters?

• Main Author: Mwanyasi, Rufus
• Other Authors: Nanyang Business School
• Format: Newsletter
• Language: English
• Published: 2023
• Subjects: Business::International business::International trade; Business; Africa; African Exchanges Linkage Project; Capital Markets; Trade; Stocks
• Online Access: https://www.ntu.edu.sg/cas/news-events/news/details/what-is-the-aelp-and-why-it-matters; https://hdl.handle.net/10356/166346
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

Africa is widely considered to be the last frontier market when it comes to doing business. However, persistent challenges of different legal systems, heightened political and currency risks, poor infrastructure and fragmented markets have hindered its growth and that has caused it to be shunned by investors. Few initiatives in the past have had varying degrees of success while most have failed. A new one - the African Exchanges Linkage Project (AELP), is the latest pan-African project aimed at unifying key regional stock markets in the spirit of the Africa Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA). Previously, investors from any African country desirous to invest in a different African country had to set up a new account through a host stockbroker in that country - an often cumbersome and tedious process. With AELP, which is jointly piloted by the African Securities Exchanges Association (ASEA) and the African Development Bank (AfDB), investors can carry out cross-border trading in the continent from a single account set up in any African country.