Resilient Bulls drive gains in the Equities Market… ASI Up 16bps

The local bourse closed on a green note as the ASI climbed 16bps to print at 27,035.78 points, buoyed by gains in NESTLE (+4.0%), DANGSUGAR (+8.2%) and GUARANTY (+0.7%). Furthermore, YTD loss softened to -14.0% and market capitalisation appreciated by N21.4bn to N13.0tn. Activity level improved as volume and value traded increased 11.3% and 13.1% to 230.7m units and N3.2bn respectively. The most active stocks by volume were ZENITH (42.3m units) GUARANTY (26.0m units), and FBNH (19.7m units) while ZENITH (N798.2m), GUARANTY (N775.7m) and NESTLE (N623.1m) led by value.

The bullish sector performance was sustained as 3 sectors gained against 2 decliners, although the AFR-ICT index sector was flat. The Consumer Goods (+2.7%) and Banking (+2.7%) indices led gainers as a result of buying interest in DANGSUGAR (+8.2%), CADBURY (+8.9%) and JAIZBANK (+9.5%). Similarly, the Insurance index was up 0.4%, underpinned by price appreciation in AIICO (+8.5%) and LAWUNION (+10.0%). Conversely, losses in WAPCO (-2.1%), CUTIX (-9.5%) and OANDO (-1.0%) drove declines in the Industrial Goods (-0.5%) and Oil & Gas  (-0.1%) indices.

Investor sentiment as measured by market breadth (advance/decline ratio) fell to 1.3x from 1.8x recorded in the previous session as 20 stocks gained against 16 losers. The top gainers were LAWUNION (+10.0%), JAIZBANK (+9.5%) and PRESCO (+9.4%) while OKOMUOIL (-9.7%), CUTIX (-9.5%) and FBNH (-7.3%) were the top losers. We expect the local bourse to sustain gains as investors continue to take postion in fundamentally sound stocks, given the OMO and T-Bills restrictions.

Market Statistics for Monday, 25th November, 2019 

Source: Afrinvest