Stock Market Returns and Shareholders’ Wealth Sustainability of Companies Listed on the Nigerian Stock Exchange

Sustainability of shareholder’s wealth has been a subject of discussion globally due to various decisions of the managers and the effect it has on company’s performance. Various corporate actions and information about the companies are disseminated over time and studies have shown the effect on shareholder's wealth. This study examined the effect of capital market returns on sustainability of shareholder's wealth in Nigeria Listed Companies. The study adopted ex-post facto research design. A sample of 57 companies from a target population of 168 companies listed on the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) as December 2018 was randomly drawn across the various market sectors for the panel data. The study used secondary data from the NSE, CBN and companies’ data on the Bloomberg Terminals. Validity and reliability were premised on the statutory audit of the financial statement. The study adopted descriptive and inferential (Regression and Correlation) statistics to analyze the data. The study found that the stock market returns indicators (dividend per share, earnings and Leverage) have joint and statistically significant relationship with market price per share: DPS, EPS and LEV with Adjusted R2 = 0.738, F(3, 796) = 54.74, p = 0.108 > 0.05. The study concluded that stock market returns measured by dividend and earnings have a significant effect on the shareholders' wealth while leverage exerts a negative effect on Market Price per share. The study recommended that the management of the companies should embrace the payment of dividend to shareholders while ensuring the growth of earnings over the period to sustain shareholder's wealth.