Ukwuegbu Anthony Chijioke

Early life

Chijioke was born in 1992 in Somolu in Lagos, the fifth of five children. He is the son of lawyer Ukwuegbu Chukwudi and primary school teacher Onyinye Ukwuegbu. He and his four siblings Ugochukwu, Nwanne, Ijeoma and Nneka where brought in Iju, Lagos; a small town about 20 km east of Ikeja. Chijioke was born Catholic and had his first Holy Communion when he turned 9. He respects all faiths and has been notably seen worshipping in mosques and numerous Protestant churches. Chijioke had his primary school education with Providence primary school from 1995 – 2002, and graduated from Providence Heights Secondary School in 2008 where his Economics teacher ignited his passion for investing.

Even as a child, Chijioke exhibited a knack for savings and making money. At the age of seven, he would trade in his ₦5 ice-cream for classmates’ buns and then resell it in the next class for ₦10. For a while he worked in his mum’s corner store. He used his savings from these transactions to buy BigBites, which he will then break into smaller units for resale. While in Secondary School he was successful in making money by capitalizing on student income cycles – building his savings during fat times to lend to schoolmates during lean times. According to him, "I just had to have enough capital to lend during lean times. It was simple Economics." Notable among his secondary school mates is Dammy Krane.

Chijioke’s interest in the stock market also dated to his secondary school. On a school trip to the Eko Tourist Beach Resort, Lagos in 2005 he struck a conversation with a fellow guest who happened to be a stockbroker. Within weeks he bought 2,000 units of African prints @ ₦1.10 and sold them six months later when the stock later tripled. He also invested in businesses as he discovered the opportunities, some of which were selling packaged (pure) water, noodles to past examination papers

As he was enjoying success in business, Chijioke performed superbly in his academics. Emerging as his secondary school valedictorian with a 305/400 jamb score in 2008 and graduating with a 4.42/5.00 CGPA from the University of Lagos.

Business

In May 2007, Chijioke made a ₦30,000 investment in his brothers IT company – Caseray Solutions, for a 30% stake. This big bet will eventually payoff in 2012 when Caseray was awarded a ₦5 million grant from the Nigerian government.

Stock

After getting acquainted with the stock market, he began researching non the stock market and how the Nigerian stock market behaves in particular. Using what he learnt, he made the African Prints investment. Proceeds from these were used to purchase 2,000units of Intercontinental Bank shares ₦13.50 during its 2006 public offer, offloading 1,000 units later at ₦40.50. More investments were made in Investments and Allied Assurance; however, this didn't prove to be a successful investment.

His stock investing philosophy is to pick out stocks with sufficient liquidity and diverse shareholding base with at least 40% free float. He then values the stock using his proprietary Tony index which is based on the ideas of John Bollinger. The Tony theory positions that the value/market price of any Nigerian stock is based on the intrinsic fundamental supporting that stock, its liquidity, and the general market perception regarding the stock and its industry. He hardly holds trading positions for extended period of time, selling them off when it reaches his expected Return On Investment.

LagTutor

In 2009, noticing the huge demand for past post-utme past questions by prospective students to the University of Lagos and its limited supply he entered the business. He’ll get the past questions, solve them, retype and make copies for sale. In his first year, he made N82,000 in sales. Demand for his services had grown so large in its second year that he entered into a partnership with his friend, Moyo. They made N314,500 in sales. In 2011 he merged LagTutor operations with that of Caseray. With Caseray providing the IT backbone for the LagTutor online testing portal. By 2012, LagTutor had become the leading admission information and online testing portal with replications from MySchoolcomm and Nigerian Scholars. In 2012, Caseray secured a N5million grant from the Nigerian government YouWIN program with LagTutor.

Ghana Trip

Fascinated with the adventures of Ghana, he decided to organize a 6-day tour with his faculty mates in September 2012. Planning for this tour began in April and by May he took a 7-day market evaluation of the tour by going to Ghana himself. On his return he set up a six-man committee to handle the marketing and organization of the trip. In May, the faculty decided to pull out from subsidizing the trip and Chijioke had to put in N42,000 of his personal money or the trip will be called off. As Murphy’s Law will have it, things got worse at the worst possible time when the University of Lagos went on a two weeks sudden break and planning had to be suspended till 16 June. On 3 July, he had an emergency surgery that kept him hospitalized for 6-days; but he kept getting daily planning updates. First payment for the trip came 14 August and subsequent payments followed. With 33 people on board at N35,000 a head, the trip took place between 27 September – 2 October 2012.

Other Business

In April 2013, he incorporated Dolphin Transport Limited, but had to suspend operations in January 2014 due to cost overruns.

Awards

November 2012; he represented University of Lagos at 2012 edition National Institute of Marketing of Nigeria Best Marketing Student Award Competition co-hosted by Unilever