Lafarge Africa Plc pays N2.00K final dividend, marginal gains on NGX

Lafarge Africa Plc said it will pay a final dividend of ₦2.00k per ₦0.50k share for FY:2022 payable from the Pioneer Reserve to shareholders whose names are in the register as of the 6th of April 2023. The company said this on the floor of the Stock Exchange. Meanwhile, the equities market reversed yesterday’s decline as the benchmark index gained 3bps to close higher at 54,904.68 points aided by price uptick in ZENITH (+1.4%), WAPCO (+2.2%), and STANBIC (+0.7%). Nonetheless, YTD return was unchanged at 7.1% while market capitalisation gained ₦10.2bn to ₦29.9tn. Meanwhile, activity level weakened as volume and value traded fell 89.9% and 44.8% to 127.7m units and ₦1.6bn respectively.

Performance across sectors under our coverage was bullish as 3 indices gained, 1 lost while the Oil & Gas and AFR-ICT indices closed flat. Leading the charge, the Insurance index rose 1.3% due to buying interest in WAPIC (+7.9%), LINKASSURE (+9.8%), and AIICO (+1.7%). Also, gains in ZENITH (+1.4%), FIDELITY (+1.0%), STERLING (+2.7%), and WAPCO (+2.2%) drove the Banking and Industrial Goods indices up 0.4% and 0.1% respectively. The Consumer Goods index was the sole loser, down 0.1% on the back of selloffs in INTBREW (-4.3%) and CADBURY (-5.8%).

Investor sentiment, as measured by market breadth, waned to 0.00x from 0.07x recorded in the previous trading session as 12 stocks advanced, 12 declined while 81 closed flat. In tomorrow’s session, we anticipate a negative outing driven by dampened sentiments. The Monetary Policy Committee of the CBN maintained a hawkish stance in its second policy meeting of 2023 which ended today. The anchor rate (the MPR) was hiked for the sixth consecutive times by 50bps to 18.0% amid onslaught against runaway inflation rate. Meanwhile, the LR and CRR were maintained at 30.0% and 32.5%, respectively.

Market Cap (₦’bn)                                29,909.95

Market Cap ($’bn)                                       64.80

NGX All-Share Index                              54,904.68

Daily Performance %                                     0.03

WTD Performance %                                     0.0

MTD Performance %                                    -1.6

QTD Performance %                                      7.1

YTD Performance %                                      7.1

Daily Volume                                             127.7

Daily Value (₦’bn)                                         1.6

Daily Value ($’m)                                           3.4

Sectoral Indices Performance

NGX 30                                                         0.0                

NGX BANKING INDEX                                     0.4

NGX INSURANCE INDEX                                 1.3

NGX CONSUMER GOODS INDEX                    -0.1

NGX OIL/GAS                                               0.0

NGX LII                                                       0.2

NGX INDUSTRIAL GOODS INDEX                   0.1

NGX-AseM