Equities sustain downtrend with fresh N73bn

By Omobayo Azeez

The Nigerian equities market maintained its downward movement on Wednesday, as negative sentiments dominated activities on 12 stocks and led to losses collectively estimated N73 billion.

Recall that the market opened the first full week in November on a positive lane on Monday with a gain of N52 billion, which, however, reversed partly on Tuesday as the market shed N13 billion and another N73 billion loss ended the midweek session.

Consequently, market value slid by 0.57 percent on, thus worsening month-to-date and year-to-date returns to -5.09 percent and -16.57 percent respectively.

The Nigerian Stock Exchange  All Share Index (NSEASI) shed 151.69 points to close at 26,223.66 basis points while market capitalization closed lower at N12.766 trillion.

Similarly, the total volume of trades decreased by 23.6 percent to 232.22 million units, valued at NGN3.12 billion and exchanged in 3,171 deals, while market breadth followed suits and declining stocks outnumbered advancing counterparts in ration12 to 10, while nine others closed on flat prices.

According to the NSE’s trading data for the session, GTbank, led nine other gainers with N0.20 to close at N26.25 per share.

While Vitafoam, Access and Flourmill gained N0.05 each to close at N3.55, N8.35 and N15.20 per share respectively, Conerstone added N0.04 to close at N0.49 per share.

On the flip side, PRECON recorded the worst loss of N3.80 to close at N34.60 per share while Dangote Cement followed with N1.60 loss to close at N147.90 per share.

Other decliners include Stanbic, InterBrew and MTN Nigeria, shedding N1.20, N1.10 and N1 to close at N37.80, N10.25 and N123 respectively.

Meanwhile, in the money market, system liquidity remained buoyant, there was a mixed theme in the fixed income market and the naira traded flat at the importer and exporter window.