Bearish run lingers to the 3rd trading day… NSE ASI down 18%

 

Proceedings in the equities market remained bearish, as the All Share Index (ASI) dipped further by 0.18 percent to 41,080.12 points, on the back of continued profit taking.
Accordingly, market capitalisation fell to N14.8 trillion as investors lost N27.4 billion. Today’s negative market performance was largely driven by profit taking in Guaranty Trust Bank (-1.4 percent), Unilever Nigeria (-5.0 percent) and Nigerian Breweries (-1.4 percent). Nonetheless, activity level was mixed as volume traded dipped 39.5 percent to 341.1 million units while value traded inched 61.7 percent), higher to N9.3 billion. Guaranty Trust Bank (162.8 million), Fidelity Bank (29.5 million) and FBN Holdings (25.9 million) were today’s top traded stocks by volume while the top traded stocks by value were Guaranty Trust Bank (N7.4 billion), Zenith Bank (N378.5 million) and FBN Holdings (N310.9 million).
Performance across sectors was mixed. The Oil & Gas index closed flat while Insurance and Industrial Goods indices advanced 1.5 percent and 0.2 percent respectively due to price appreciations in AXAMansard (+4.7 percent), Linkage Assurance (+3.6 percent), Cement Company of Northern Nigeria (CCNN) (+4.9 percent) and Dangote Cement (+0.4 percent). On the other hand, the Banking and Consumer Goods indices trended southwards, inching 0.5 percent and 0.8 percent lower respectively as a result of profit taking in Guaranty Trust Bank (-1.4 percent), UBA (-0.4 percent), Unilever Nigeria (-5.0 percent) and Nigerian Breweries (-1.4 percent).
Investor sentiment measured by market breadth (advance/decline ratio) weakened further to 0.8x from 1.0x recorded in the preceding trading session as 22 stocks advanced compared to 27 stocks that declined. The top performers were VERITASKAP (+5.7 percent), CCNN (+4.9 percent) and MANSARD (+4.7 percent) while Japaul Oil (-8.3 percent), Cutix (-5.0 percent) and Unilever Nigeria (-5.0 percent) were the worst performers.