#EndSARS: Access Bank Investors Jittery, Dump Stock Following Customers Boycott

Investors' confidence in Access Bank is dropping as there was a massive sell-off leading to the bank's share price plummeting. The decline in the bank's share price follows online protest to boycott Access Bank for freezing accounts belonging to #EndSARS protesters without a court order.

Access Bank had blocked accounts of eight protesters who took part in the #EndSARS protest after receiving a directive from the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN). Access Bank restricted the accounts despite its rival, Stanbic IBTC stating that without a court order, it won't be freezing its customers' accounts.

Afterwards, CBN approached the court to receive a court order to freeze 20 accounts of #EndSARS protesters across various banks, which included Zenith Bank, First Bank, and GTBank - Access Bank had already frozen the accounts before CBN approached the court for an order.

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The decision by Access Bank resulted in a nationwide online protest, with some customers taking to social media to announce that they would be shutting down their Access Bank accounts while suggesting others to do same in solidarity.

Although Access Bank defended its decision, stating that it can't ignore a directive from its regulator, but Stanbic IBTC's stance against the CBN directive nullified Access Bank's excuse, and it didn't douse the criticism - Access Bank has already been sued for NGN100 million.

Investors Getting Jittery, Dumping Access Bank Shares

With the threat hanging over Access Bank, investors are getting jittery, as their confidence dropped within the period of protest against the Herbert Wigwe-led bank. When the stock market opened this week, on Monday, supply for Access Bank shares was higher than the demand.

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This led to a fall in Access Bank's share price. On Friday, November 13, Access Bank's share price slumped to NGN9.15 kobo from the NGN10 per share it closed market with the previous day.

During the weekend when the protest picked again, Access Bank's stock price declined further, opening trading with NGN9.15 kobo on Monday, only to close the market with a significant fall to NGN8.70 kobo - as existing investors rush to the market with more shares than demanded.

At the time of filing this report, Access Bank's shares were down again by -3.45%, currently, with a loss of NGN0.3 kobo off the NGN8.70 kobo the lender opened the market with - Access Bank is expected to remain on the losers table for two days straight since the weekend boycott began.