Losses in Guinness, Nestle, FBNH depress stock market 

Price losses in Guinness, Nestle and First Bank Nigeria Holding at the Nigerian Stock Exchange dragged the All Share Index (ASI) down 11bps to settle at 31,145.34 points. Hence, market capitalisation shed N12.4 billion to settle at N11.6 trillion while YTD loss worsened to -0.9 per cent. Activity level was however mixed as volume traded declined 30.2 per cent to 247.6 million units while value traded advanced by 63.4 per cent to N3.1 billion. ZENITH (56.4m units), ACCESS (36.2m units) and STERLING (32.3m units) led the top trades by volume while ZENITH (N1.3bn), NIGERIAN BREWERIES (N844.0m) and ACCESS (N218.1m) were the top traded stocks by value.

Performance across sectors was bullish as 4 of 5 indices under our coverage closed in the green. The Banking index appreciated the most gaining 2.4 per cent due to bargain hunting in GUARANTY (+0.6%) and ZENITH (+0.2%), trailed by the Oil & Gas index, up 1.4 per cent on account of buy interests in SEPLAT (+2.9%) and OANDO (+1.0%). Additionally, Insurance and Industrial Goods indices inched higher, up 0.9 per cent and 0.2 per cent respectively following gains in CUSTODIA (+1.5%), LINKASSURE (+8.9%) and BETAGLASS (+7.8%). On the negative side, the Consumer Goods index shed 0.8% on the back of selloffs in GUINNESS (-8.5%) and FLOURMILL (-2.1%).

Investor sentiment as measured by market breadth (advance/decline ratio) strengthened to 1.2x from 0.5x recorded yesterday as 23 stocks advanced against 19 that declined. CORNERSTONE (+10.0%), MBENEFIT (+10.0%) and ABCTRANS (+9.7%) were the top performing stocks  while AIRSERVICE (-9.8%), LASACO (-9.4%) and MCNICHOLS (-9.1%) led laggards. We maintain a bearish outlook on the market in the near term as investors book profits following the prior weeks rally in the equities market.

Market Statistics Wednesday, 30th January 2019

Market Cap (N’bn)                                   11,614.3

Market Cap (US$’bn)                                     37.9

NSE All-Share Index                              31,145.34

Daily Performance %                                      (0.1)

1 Week Performance %                                   0.9

YTD Performance %                                        (0.9)

Daily Volume (Million)                                    247.6

Daily Value (N’bn)                                              3.1

Daily Value (US$’m)                                          10.2