Proshare at 20: A Village Square Story of Data, Trust, and the Long Road to Market Wisdom – OpEd

There is an old saying among the Yoruba: “A kì í rántí ọjọ́ òjò títí tí ilẹ̀ fi gbẹ” – We do not remember the rainy season until the earth has dried. So it is with institutions that quietly become indispensable. You notice their absence, not their presence.

Twenty years ago, in December 2006, in the bustling chaos of Lagos, where young traders stood on Broad Street corners with rumours in their pockets and hope in their eyes – a different kind of market opened. Not for yams or gari, not for textiles or electronics, but for something far more precious and perishable: the truth about money.

This is the story of Proshare, which turns twenty in 2026. But like all good village square stories, it is not just about one enterprise. It is about why markets fail when information is hoarded, why trust becomes currency when naira falters, and why the elders say: “Ọ̀rọ̀ tó bá jẹ ẹ̀san, ọmọdé á rò ó” – Even a child can interpret a proverb that is true.

ACT ONE: The Market Square Where Everyone Was Shouting but No One Was Listening

Cast your mind back to the mid-2000s. The Nigerian Stock Exchange was like a village festival where everyone claimed to know which masquerade would perform next. Tips passed from uncle to nephew, from banker to trader, from beer parlour to boardroom. “Buy this bank!” “Sell that telecom!” “The big man has inside information!”

But as the elders warn: “Ẹni tó bá pa òwe, yóò ní láti túmọ̀ ọ́” – He who speaks in proverbs must be prepared to interpret them. The market had plenty of proverbs (stock tips, insider whispers, analyst predictions), but no one was obliged to explain themselves when the masquerade fell.

Into this arena walked Olufemi Awoyemi, a man who understood that markets are built on two foundations: ‘information and integrity’. Without the first, investors are blind. Without the second, they are betrayed. He founded Proshare not as a news agency (Lagos had plenty of those), not as a brokerage (the streets were full of them), but as something Nigeria’s capital market had never quite seen – an independent ombudsman armed with data instead of opinions.

The name itself carried meaning. ‘Proshare’ – to be “for” sharing, not hoarding information like cowries in a leather pouch. Not selling access to the highest bidder. The goal was to democratize financial intelligence so that the small man in Surulere, Kakuri, Orlu, Uyo, and Anguldi could see what the big man in Asokoro, Unguwar Rimi, Park View, Ikoyi, and Banana Island already knew.

ACT TWO: Building the Village Well (2006-2021)

In the beginning, Proshare was #TheAnalyst – a digital tool that did something radical for Nigerian retail investors: it showed them market performance without requiring a Bloomberg terminal or a cousin in a brokerage house. It was like building the first public well in a village where water had always been owned by chiefs.

The old people say: “Àsìkò méjì ò lè jogún kan” -Two periods cannot inherit the same legacy. Proshare’s first decade (2006-2016) was the era of the town crier. They shouted truths that made corporate boards uncomfortable. They asked regulators questions with no easy answers. They published research that exposed the gap between official narratives and market realities.

But as Awoyemi himself has written, technology ages and is soon replaced. What endures is connecting with people and creating value. By the time Proshare reached its 15th year in 2021, the leadership understood a fundamental truth: information was becoming commoditized. Every bank had an analyst. Every newspaper had a markets section. Every WhatsApp group had a “financial expert.”

The question was stark: Would Proshare become yesterday’s town crier, shouting news that everyone already knew? Or could it evolve into something the market still desperately needed – a trusted interpreter, not just of what happened, but of what it meant?

ACT THREE: From Town Crier to Village Oracle (2019-2026)

They say: “Bí ọmọdé bá dàgbà, ọgbọ́n a kún ọ lọ́wọ́” – When a child matures, wisdom fills their hands. Proshare’s transformation began quietly in 2019, gained recognition from the London Stock Exchange the same year, and culminated in a full platform rebranding in 2022.

What emerged was no longer just a news portal. Proshare had “cobbled together”—to use Awoyemi’s own words from his 2026 New Year message, three distinct services into a unified offering:

1. Best-in-class analyst services: data-backed analytics and research that moved beyond reporting to prediction
2. News and media capabilities: financial journalism that provided context, not just content
3. Advocacy platform: an ombudsman role through stakeholder engagements that hold power accountable

These three services were backed by common technology infrastructure, financial controls, service excellence frameworks, and – critically, a 20-year reputation for credibility that cannot be bought, only earned.

The company migrated to the proshare.co domain, signaling a new identity. It structured itself around five professional practice areas: Digital Media, Market Intelligence, Impact Research, Strategic Advisory, and Investor Relations. Each vertical served a specific market need. Together, they created an ecosystem.

And in 2026, after four years of development, Proshare announced the coming beta launch of #AskProshare – an AI-enabled platform that represents not just technological sophistication, but a fundamental shift in how Nigerian market participants can access intelligence once reserved for institutional investors in London and New York.

ACT FOUR: What the Elders Taught Us About Markets and Trust

But here is where folklore wisdom becomes essential. The elders say: “Ìwà l’ẹwà” – character is beauty. All the technology, all the rebranding, all the new verticals would mean nothing if Proshare had compromised the one asset that made it valuable in the first place: independence.

In Nigeria’s information ecosystem – where paid content masquerades as journalism, where “analysts” double as undisclosed promoters, where every “research report” comes with invisible caveats, Proshare’s stubborn insistence on credibility became its competitive moat.

Awoyemi’s 2026 New Year message emphasized this explicitly: “Platforms evolve, but integrity remains fundamental. Methods improve, but our commitment to credibility stays constant.” This was not marketing. It was a survival strategy. In a market where everyone lies a little (and some lie a lot), the institution that consistently tells the truth becomes indispensable.

Over 20 years and fifteen major iterations of its business model, Proshare has learned to balance inherent contradictions: how to be an independent watchdog while also being a commercial entity; how to challenge power while collaborating with regulators; how to serve institutional clients without abandoning retail investors.

The proverb says: “Kò sí èyí tó yé e tó bá gòkè” – Nothing is perfect if you climb high enough to examine it. But the test of an institution is not perfection; it is whether the market is better off because it exists. By that measure, Proshare has passed.

ACT FIVE: The Proshare Model and Nigeria’s Capital Market Future

There is a deeper lesson here about sovereignty and data. As Awoyemi noted in his message, “What doesn’t get measured doesn’t get done.” For too long, Nigeria relied on foreign rating agencies to tell us what our own economy looked like. We waited for the IMF reports to understand our own fiscal position. We needed Western analysts to validate what Nigerian businesspeople already knew.

Proshare represents – imperfectly, incompletely, but genuinely – an alternative. It is Nigeria building its own capacity to understand Nigerian markets. It is local expertise interpreting local complexity for local and international audiences. It is what Awoyemi has called “connecting people with actionable intelligence, creating value through clarity, and building trust through consistency.”

The market no longer asks, “What does a foreign platform say?” before asking, “What does Proshare say?” That shift, from deference to foreign sources to confidence in domestic analysis, is profound. It does not mean Proshare is always right. It means Nigerian investors now have a Nigerian institution they trust enough to check first.

In 2026, as the company enters its third decade, it faces challenges that would have been unimaginable in 2006: AI integration, algorithmic trading, decentralized finance, climate-linked disclosure requirements, ESG reporting mandates. The tools will change. The platforms will evolve. But as Awoyemi emphasized: “Technologies change, but relationships endure. Platforms evolve, but integrity remains fundamental.”

EPILOGUE: The Village Square at Twenty

There is a final proverb worth remembering: “Igi tó ga jù ń jẹ ẹ̀fúùfù” – The tallest tree catches the wind. Proshare, by virtue of its prominence and independence, will face scrutiny, pressure, and the temptation to compromise that comes with institutional maturity.

The question for the next 20 years is not whether Proshare will adopt new technologies (it will), expand into new markets (it must), or face new competitors (inevitable). The question is whether it will preserve the fundamental bargain that made it valuable: “trading integrity for insights, credibility for capital, independence for influence.”

As Awoyemi concluded his 2026 message: “The next 20 years will demand even more from us. We’re ready. Not because we have all the answers, but because we’ve learned that staying grounded in our core values while remaining agile in our approach is the only sustainable path forward.”

That is not just corporate philosophy. It is wisdom earned through 20 years of navigating Nigeria’s volatile economic landscape without losing direction. It is what the elders mean when they say: “Ìgbà kan ní mo ń wò ẹ, ìgbà kejì ní ẹ ń wò mi” – I watch you for a while, then you watch me. Trust is reciprocal and must be earned daily.

To the team at Proshare, the subscribers who have challenged and supported them, the regulators who have engaged in constructive tension, and the market participants who depend on their analysis: twenty years is both a milestone and a foundation.

The village square remains open. The well still flows. The oracle has learned new languages. And Nigeria’s capital market and the economic nexus, for all its flaws, scandals, and periodic chaos, is measurably better because one institution decided that information should not be a luxury good.

As they say in the old tales: “Títí ni t’ìró, títí ni t’ọ̀run” – It is a long road to the market, and a long road to heaven. Proshare has walked for the first 20 years. May they find the wisdom to walk the next 20 without losing their way.

Happy 20th Anniversary to Proshare. 

About the Author

Ade ADEFEKO is a policy analyst specialising in agricultural value chains and fiscal policy in emerging markets. His work focuses on the intersection of public policy, private sector development, and agrarian transformation in Sub-Saharan Africa.  

ABOUT PROSHARE

Proshare is Nigeria’s leading capital markets intelligence platform, providing institutional-quality research, real-time market data, and independent analysis to investors and market participants across Africa. For more information, visit www.proshare.co or contact ceo@proshare.co and  research@proshare.co