By Charles Abuede
Buying interest in StanbicIBTC, FBN Holdings and Guaranty Trust Bank (GTB) gave momentum on the Nigerian equities market as it maintained its bullish streak following a six-day positive run to midweek, with as investors, as well as market analysts, expectant of some profit-taking deals as the week draws to a close.
Buying interest in STANBIC (+4.5%), FBNH (+1.0%) and GUARANTY (+0.2%) drove the all-share index up 15 basis points to settle at 25,330.10 points. As a result, investors gained N20 billion as market capitalisation advanced to N13.2 trillion while the year to date (YTD) loss moderated to -5.6 per cent.
However, the activity level on the trading floor was mixed as volume traded fell 28.1 per cent to 180.7 million units while value traded rose 16.0 per cent to N1.4 billion. The top traded stocks by volume were FIDELITY (26.6 million units), UBA (19.5 million units) and ACCESS (19 million units) while NESTLE (N198.1 million), ZENITH (N172.8 million) and GUARANTY (N159.5 million) led by value.
There was a mixed performance across sectors as two indices out of six recorded a loss, one gained while three closed flat. Also, the Insurance and Banking indices closed negative, down by 92 basis points and three basis points respectively owing to price drops in UBA (-1.5%), CORNERSTONE (-9.7%) and CUSTODIAN (-2.0%).
On the flip side, the Consumer Goods index was the lone gainer, up 16bps due to buying interest in PZ (+5.0%), CHAMPION (+7.1%) and GUINNESS (+1.3%).
Lastly, there was also a flat close in the Oil & Gas, Industrial Goods and AFR-ICT indices.
Meanwhile, the investor sentiment as measured by market breadth (advance/decline ratio) strengthened to 3.0x from the 0.8x recorded previously as 24 stocks gained against the 8 that declined.
The top gainers were FTNCOCOA (+10.0%), NNFM (+9.8%) and UPL (+9.6%) while CORNERSTONE (-9.7%), AFRIPRUD (-6.7%) and WAPIC (-2.9%) lost the most.
