Bull Run continues as banks buoy Nigeria bourse performance

Charles Abuede

The Bull Run continued Tuesday on the Nigerian Stock Exchange as banking sector indices helped buoy market performance on the local bourse.

The banking sector produced significant upticks in the stocks of United Bank for Africa (UBA) and Access Bank which helped to drive the market’s continued bullish streak.

With the recorded performance on Tuesday, analysts at Afrinvest Research say they expect more sustained gains on the back of improved investor appetite.

The stock market sustained the previous day’s positive performance as gains in Nigerian Breweries (+5.4%), UBA (+4.8%) and ETI (+6.4%) drove the benchmark index up 34 basis points to settle at 25,413.76 points. As a result, investors gained N45.3 billion as market capitalisation advanced to N13.3 trillion while the year to date loss moderated to -5.3 per cent.

Similarly, the trading activity level was mixed as volume traded spiked 255.6 per cent to 1.1 billion units while value traded declined -19.9 per cent to N2.1 billion. The top traded stocks by volume were Access Bank at 22.7 million units; Guaranty Trust Bank, at 10.9 million units; and Fidelity Bank at 8.5 million units; while Dangote Cement, with N356.2 million; Guaranty Trust Bank, with N279.4 million; and Access Bank with N150.0 million, led by value.

Bullish Sector Performance 

Sector performances also showed a bullish outing as four out of six indices closed in the green. The banking and consumer goods indices were the best performers, up 107 basis points and 88 basis points respectively, owing to price upticks in UBA (+4.8%), Access (+3.2%) and Nigerian Breweries (+5.4%).

Similarly, gains in AIICO (+5.6%) and MTNN (+0.2%) buoyed the insurance and AFR-ICT indices, which ticked higher by 80 basis points and 9 basis points, respectively.

On the flip side, the industrial goods index was the lone loser, down 12 basis points due to sell pressures in Dangote Cement (-0.7%), while the oil & gas index closed flat.

Investor sentiment improves

There was an improvement in the investor sentiment as measured by market breadth (advance/decline ratio) which climbed to 3.0x from the 0.7x recorded previously as 27 stocks gained against the 9 that declined. The top gainers were Livestock (+10.0%), Eterna (+9.5%) and JAIZ Bank (+8.9%), while WAPIC (-5.7%), UBN (-5.7%) and PZ (-2.4%) lost the most.