Equities market closes trading week on a positive note… NSE ASI up 0.4%

The 3-day bearish run of the local bourse was halted in today’s trading session as NSE All Share Index (ASI) rose 0.4% to settle at 37,392.77 points while YTD loss moderated to 2.2%. Today’s positive performance is attributable to buying interest in NESTLE (+1.8%), WAPCO (+8.7%) and SEPLAT (+2.4%). Accordingly, investors gained N60.2bn as market capitalisation grew to N13.5tn. Conversely, activity level decreased as volume and value traded fell 19.3% and 21.5% to 212.2m units and N3.2bn respectively. The top traded stocks by volume were ACCESS (84.9m), DANGSUGAR (15.2m) and SOVRENINS (14.7m) while ACCESS (N864.7m), NIGERIAN BREWERIES (N406.9m) and SEPLAT (N302.5m) were the top traded stocks by value.

Across sectors, performance was largely bullish as 4 of 5 indices under our coverage trended northwards. The Industrial Goods index gained the most, up 3.3% as a result of buying interest in WAPCO (+8.7%). Similarly, the Oil & Gas and Consumer Goods indices rose 0.7% and 0.5% respectively due to bargain hunting in SEPLAT (+2.4%), NESTLE (+1.8%) and DANGSUGAR (+1.5%). Likewise, the Banking index closed in the green, up 0.4% following gains in UBN (+3.5%), ACCESS (+1.5%) and GUARANTY (+0.1%). On the flipside, the Insurance index was the lone loser, shedding 0.4% on the back of losses in MBENEFIT (-8.1%), PRESTIGE (-3.9%) and NIGERINS (-3.7%).

Investor sentiment as measured by market breadth (advance/decline ratio) strengthened to 0.7x from 0.5x recorded in the preceding session as 17 stocks advanced compared to 26 that declined. The top performing stocks were SOVRENINS (+9.5%), WAPCO (+8.7%) and CILEASING (+7.4%) while TANTALIZER (-10.0%), CUSTODIAN (-10.0%) and MCNICHOLS (-9.9%) were the worst performers. Following a rebound in the market today, we expect the positive performance to be sustained in early trades next week as investors continue to take advantage of current cheap valuations. However, we note that as investor sentiment remains soft, the positive performance will be followed by a bout of profit taking which will pull the broader index lower.

Market Statistics Friday, 13th July 2018

Market Cap (N’bn)                           13,545.6

Market Cap (US$’bn)                             44.2

NSE All-Share Index                      37,392.77

Daily Performance %                              0.4

Week Performance %                          (0.6)

YTD Performance %                           (2.2)

Daily Volume (Million)                         212.2

Daily Value (N’bn)                                  3.2

Daily Value (US$’m)                            10.6