WorldStage– Corporate trustees and financial market stakeholders say recent regulatory reforms are reshaping Nigeria’s trusteeship landscape, expanding fiduciary responsibilities and imposing stricter compliance obligations across the financial system.
The stakeholders stated this in a communiqué issued at the end of the Association of Corporate Trustees (ACT) 2026 Annual Conference in Lagos on Monday.
They added that the reforms were raising accountability standards across the financial system.
Speaking on the relevance of the theme, ACT President, Omolola Iyinolakan, said corporate trustees had found themselves at the centre of multiple political and financial reforms.
Iyinolakan noted the impact of reforms on investor protection, compliance obligations, cross-border investment monitoring, institutional accountability, taxation, infrastructure bond investments and ongoing recapitalisation efforts within the financial sector.
She also identified the Investment and Securities Act (ISA) 2025, Data Privacy Act 2023, Tax Act 2025 and recapitalisation regulations for capital market operators as some of the major reforms redefining trusteeship operations.
“The theme of this conference reflects our commitment to positioning trustees as proactive agents of compliance, transparency, and investor confidence.
“Trustees are actually at the interception of a lot of reforms but I dare say that it is not just the corporate trustees.
“The reforms we have seen over the last one year do not affect the capital market alone, it has had ripple effect on the entire populace,” Iyinolakan said.
Director-General, Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Dr Emomotimi Agama, said the reforms reflected a broader transformation of Nigeria’s economic and financial governance architecture.
The communique quoted that Agama was represented by the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Finance, Mr Raymond Omachi.
He said trusteeship practices must evolve in line with the changing regulatory environment, describing the current reforms as bold steps necessary to create a new economy and to create a new order.
“Hence, we are living through a rare convergence; the enactment of the Investment and Security Act 2023, the progressive activation of the Nigeria Capital Market institutional infrastructure, the emergence of fiscal and fiduciary instruments growing regulatory imperative to align the global best practices,” he said.
Agama asserted that the changing regulatory landscape had elevated the strategic importance of corporate trustees within the financial system.
He said corporate Trusteeship, long positioned at the interception of law; financial and fiduciary obligations, now provided a vantage point of extraordinary strategic importance.
“The ISA provides explicit and expanded recognition of the trustee function in the capital market, it articulates greater precision of the obligations in the context of policies of investment schemes while it established clear accountability frameworks”, he further noted.
Agama stressed that corporate trustees played a critical role in sustaining confidence in the capital market and supporting economic development.
He said corporate trustees were not a peripheral player in Nigeria’s economic development story, but a foundational one.
“The growth of the capital market and through it, the financing of infrastructural projects as well as other metrics of economic development run in part through the quality, strength and integrity of the practice of corporate trustees,” he said.
He urged trustees to ensure deliberate investments in systems, talent and processes capable of meeting the growing expectations arising from the reforms.
Agama also emphasised the need for continuous capacity building, stronger collaboration between regulators and industry stakeholders, and effective deployment of governance structures to support compliance.
He advocated the importance of preparing for future regulatory trends, expanding fiduciary obligations and strengthening oversight mechanisms in response to innovation in financial transactions and data protection requirements.
