Despite the fact that investing apps have significantly contributed to the democratization of the process of buying and selling stocks, they often function in silos and only provide access to exchanges located in a single nation.
Even globally oriented platforms like eToro only provide access to the most prominent exchanges and provide a small selection of the others. Only 24 of the 118 businesses registered on the Oslo Stock Exchange are accessible for trading on eToro, to use one simple example.
Additionally, many trading applications are exclusively accessible in one nation since any brokerage must obtain a license from the appropriate regulator inside each country it services.
Investment apps have fallen short of their promise to make investing in securities simple and available to everyone, especially for emerging economies where there are few cross-border opportunities.
Businesses like Bamboo, Chaka, and Trove have recently developed in Nigeria to allow users to trade and invest in international markets, primarily in U.S. equities and funds, but Trove also offers some Chinese companies, in an effort to address this issue.
This month, Bamboo entered Ghana, making it the first international brokerage app in west Africa.
Richmond Bassey, the CEO, and co-founder of Bamboo said that in addition to assisting Africans in investing outside of the continent, Bamboo would eventually aim to encourage international investment into Africa when the firm received a $15 million series A financing in January.
At the time, he stated, “We also want to make it simple for African investors in the diaspora to find the finest investment opportunities on the continent.”
Bringing together African Stock Markets
While Bamboo has not yet taken any action to make it possible to purchase non-American stocks on the platform, one Ghanaian FinTech is attempting to solve the problem of the continent’s fragmented capital markets by enabling anybody to invest in and trade on several African stock exchanges.
