Finance

Benchmark index closes flattish… ASI up 1bp

Published

7 years ago

January 22, 2019

In today’s trading session, the local equities market rebounded albeit flattish, up 1bp to 30,736.9 points following gains in GUARANTY (+1.3%), ZENITH (+1.4%) and SEPLAT (+1.9%). As a result, YTD loss improved to 2.2% while market capitalisation increased by N1.6bn to N11.5tn. However, activity level fell as volume and value traded declined by 51.0% and 56.0% to 245m units and N2.4bn. In terms of volume, the most active stocks for the day were DIAMOND (71.6m units), ACCESS (27.0m units) and GUARANTY (27.0m units while the top traded stocks by value were GUARANTY (N848.0m), ZENITH (N236.0m) and SEPLAT (N193.8m).

On a sectoral basis, performance remained mixed with a bearish bias as only 2 of 5 indices under our coverage closed in the green. The Oil & Gas index advanced the most, up 1.7%, following price appreciation in SEPLAT (+1.9%) and OANDO (+6.8%). In the same vein, the Banking index rose 0.8% due to gains in GUARANTY (+1.3%), ZENITH (+1.4%) and FIDELITY (+3.5%). On the flip side, the Industrial Goods index shed the most, down 2.5% following losses in CCNN (-7.1%). Similarly, the Consumer Goods and Insurance Indices declined by 0.3% and 0.4% respectively, weighed by price depreciation in NIGERIAN BREWERIES (-1.2%), NEM (-3.9%), WAPIC (-4.8%) and SOVERENINS (-8.3%).

Market breadth (advance/decline ratio), a measure of investor sentiment settled at 2.6x as 26 stocks advanced against 9 stocks that declined; this was higher than 0.7x in yesterday’s trading session. The top performing stocks for the day were LINKASSURE (+9.8%), REDSTAREX (+9.1%) and NAHCO (+8.4%) while SOVRENINS (-8.3%), CCNN (-7.1%) and WAPIC (-4.8%) were the biggest losers. Despite the slightly positive performance today, we expect to see profit taking in subsequent sessions.

Market Statistics Monday, 21st January 2019

Market Cap (N’bn) 11,462.1

Market Cap (US$’bn) 37.4

NSE All-Share Index 30,736.88