This study examined the trend of financial development and foreign direct investment in Nigeria. It also investigated the impact of financial development on foreign direct investment in Nigeria. This is with the view of analyzing the impact of Foreign Direct Investment on Financial Market Development in Nigeria from the period 1980 to 2022. The study employed Auto-Regressive Distributive Lag (ARDL). Annual time series data for all the variables were sourced from the World Development Indicator (WDI) and Central Bank Statistical Bulletin 2020 edition. The result of the trend analysis observed that indicators of financial market development (that is, market capitalization and credit to the private sector as a ratio of real GDP) and foreign direct investment experienced increase but unstable performance over the period of study. The regression estimate showed that financial market development (measured by market capitalization and credit to private sector as a ratio of a real GDP) had significant and positive influence on the inflow of foreign direct investment during the study period. This study concluded that financial market development contributes significantly to the inflow of foreign direct investment in Nigeria. The study recommends the need for policymakers to implement policies capable of encouraging domestic investment and improve the performance of the stock market in order to maintain a strong link between stock market development and foreign direct investment in Nigeria.