Domestic Equities Market sustains gain… ASI Up 0.5%

The local bourse closed on a positive note as the All-Share Index (ASI) rose 51bps to settle at 26,569.80points following buying interest in GUARANTY (+3.6%), NIGERIAN BREWERIES (+2.8%) and DANGSUGAR (+6.0%). The market capitalisation grew by N65.5bn to N12.8tn as YTD loss further moderated to -15.5%. Activity level improved as volume and value traded advanced by 77.6% and 1.6% to 319.7m units and N3.1bn respectively. In terms of volume, the most active stocks for the day were UNIONDAC (187.0m units), FIDELITY (19.8m units) and DANGCEM (12.3m units) while DANGCEM (N1.7bn), GUINNESS (N236.3m) and ZENITH (N201.7m) were the top traded stocks by value.

Performance across sectors was bullish as 4 of 6 indices under our coverage closed in the green. The Consumer Goods index advanced the most, up 1.2% due to buying interest in DANGSUGAR (+6.0%) and CADBURY (+9.4%) while the Banking index trailed, rising 1.1% on the back of gains in GUARANTY (+3.6%) and UBA (+1.5%). Similarly, the Insurance and Oil & Gas indices rose 0.3% and 0.2% respectively following price appreciation in NEM (+2.6%), CHIPLC (+5.4%) and OANDO (+1.3%). On the flip side, the Industrial Goods index led laggards, down 0.2% on account of losses in WAPCO (-0.7%) and CUTIX (-9.4%). Sell-offs in CHAMS (-8.8%) and COURTVILLE (-4.0%) dragged the AFR-ICT index (0.004%) lower.

Investor sentiment as measured by market breadth (advance/decline ratio) strengthened to 1.3x from the 0.9x recorded yesterday with 17 stocks advancing against 13 that declined. PRESCO (+9.5%), CADBURY (+9.4%) and UACN (+6.0%) were the best performing stocks while NEIMETH (-9.6%), CUTIX (-9.4%) and CHAMS (-8.8%) led laggards. We expect the bullish performance to be sustained in the subsequent session however, we maintain our bearish outlook in the near term.

Market Statistics for Thursday, 12th December, 2019 

Source: Afrinvest