Sell-Offs Across Bellwethers Halts 2-Day Bullish Streak in Local Bourse…ASI Down 1.1%

In today’s session, the local bourse turned bearish as sell offs across bellwethers weighed on the equities market in today’s session halting a 2-day bullish run. Sell-Offs in DANGCEM (-2.6%), ZENITHBANK (-1.5%) and GUARANTY (-0.9%) drove the All Share Index (“ASI”) lower by 1.1% to settle at 30,819.10 points while YTD loss worsened to -19.4%. Investors wealth declined as market capitalisation fell N121.4bn to close at N11.3tn. Activity level also strengthened as volume and value traded rose by 41.4% and 7.8% respectively to close at 280.9m units and N2.5bn respectively. The top traded stocks by volume in today’s session were FBNH (92.5m units), DIAMONDBNK (68.2m units) and IKEJAHOTEL (34.4m units) while the top traded stocks by value were FBNH (N707.3m), GUARANTY (N507.8m), and NIGERIAN BREWERIES (N319.0m).

Sector performance in this session remained bearish as 3 of the 5 sectors under our coverage closed southwards. The Industrial Goods index closed as the worst performing index in today’s session as losses in DANGCEM (-2.6%) drove the index lower by 1.6%. The Banking and Consumer Goods index trailed shedding 0.8% and 0.3% respectively as sell pressures in ACCESS (-2.7%), ZENITH (-1.5%), VITAFORM (-4.4%) and UNILEVER (-1.5%) weighed on both indices. The Oil & Gas and Insurance indices closed in the green as gains in OANDO (+4.0%), MBENEFIT (+9.5%) and AIICO (+6.1%) pulled both indices higher by 0.5% and 0.2%.

Investor sentiment as measured by market breadth (advance/decline ratio) weakened to 0.8x from 1.1x recorded in Wednesday’s session as 17 stocks advanced against 22 decliners. The best performing stocks in today’s session were CHAMPION (+9.7%), MBENEFIT (+9.5%) and DIAMONDBNK (+9.4%) while NIGERINS (-9.1%), LASACO (-6.9%) and AGLEVENT (-6.9%) led the laggards in today’s session. In line with our anticipated bearish outlook for the local bourse, market performance turned negative with several bellwethers shedding prices. Thus, we expect bargain hunting in bellwethers will help drive positive performance in tomorrow’s session.

Market Statistics Thursday, 6th December 2018

Market Cap (N’bn)                             11,251.4

Market Cap (US$’bn)                               36.8

NSE All-Share Index                          30,819.10

Daily Performance %                                (1.1)

1 Week Performance %                            0.7

YTD Performance %                            (19.4)

Daily Volume (Million)                          280.9

Daily Value (N’bn)                                  2.5

Daily Value (US$’m)                               8.1

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