Abstract

This study aims to evaluate agricultural and other real estate investment industry in the Nigerian stock market. The study is necessary because there are formal and informal interests in diversifying Nigeria’s economy through agriculture. In addition, there is no known study on the performance of the agricultural type of real estate investment compared to other types of the investment. The performance of agricultural real estate investment industry and other real estate investment industry in the Nigerian stock market were evaluated and compared over the study period to achieve the study aim. The bulk of data obtained for the study were secondarily sourced. The data were extracted from the records and reports of the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE), Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Statistics Database over a period ranging from 2008-2017. Standard deviation, the coefficient of variation and Sharpe index were used to measure the performances of the selected assets in terms of their risk-return profiles. Using both coefficient of variation and Sharpe index performance measure, agricultural real estate investment outperformed non-agricultural real estate investment in the Nigerian stock market. The result implies that Agricultural real estate gives higher investment benefits than non-agricultural real estate. The study recommends that investors and portfolio managers should consider agricultural real estate to enjoy its high returns potential.

Key Words: Agriculture, Performance, Real estate investment, Stock market