NGX ASI inches up as gain in banking, oil stocks rally

In today’s trading session, the Nigeria Stock Market recovered prior losses as the benchmark index added 22bps to close at 97,477.80 points.  Demands for Tier-1 banking tickers GTCO, ZENITHBANK, FBNH, UBA and ACCESSCORP were the primary driver of  the market’s performance. Accordingly, the year-to-date (YTD) return increased to 30.36%, while the market capitalization gained  ₦131.65bn to close at ₦59.07tn.
Analysis of today’s market activities showed trade turnover settled lower relative to the previous session, with the value of transactions down by 18.91%. A total of 247.01m shares valued at ₦7.51bn were exchanged in 8,305 deals.
ACCESSCORP (+2.70%) led the volume chart with 40.00m units traded while ARADEL (+0.00%) led the value chart in deals worth ₦1.68bn.
Market breadth closed positive at a 1.53-to-1 ratio with advancing issues outnumbering declining ones. INTENEGINS (+10.00%) topped twenty-eight (28) others on the leader’s log, while REGALINS (-10.00%) led eighteen (18) others on the laggard’s table. The Nigerian Exchange trending positively as buy side equities investors take over trading session on Wednesday.  The local bourse has shown sign of gaining, reversing riskoff sentiment seen in the previous day. The market index climbed by 14 basis points at the time of writing. Stock analysts said this may not be sufficient to calm the negative tempest down but provides a buffer for a positive close on the day. Oando Plc that has been on loss making streak is trading positive and market gain is also supported by positive price movement in banking names.
Tier-1 bank are keeping uptrend during the intraday trading session on NGX platform.  At mid-day, the NGX All Share Index witnessed a positive trajectory, reflecting a gain of 0.14%, Alpha Morgan Capital Limited said in a note. Stockbrokers said this upward movement is a result of buying sentiment of investors in some mid to high capitalized stocks. These stocks include Dangote Sugar Refinery Plc, United Capital Plc and Oando Plc.  Others are banking names, especially tier-1 financial institutions Trading data showed that Ticker: DANGSUGAR has gained 5.08% while UCAP is up by 1.88%. Pan African lender, UBA has appreciated by 1.90%, ACCESSCORP is up by 1.66% while OANDO has also gained 1.53%.  Ticker: STERLINGNG has seen a marginal uptick of 0.82% during the intraday session, and FBNH is up by 0.73%. GTCO has seen 0.65% increase in price movement while ZENITHBANK gained 0.48% on NGX at noon.