Equities drop by 0.40% on Seplat, Dangote Sugar shares

 

Sustained profit taking in today’s session dragged market performance for the fourth consecutive trading session as the All Share Index (ASI) slid 0.40 percent to settle at 40,914.94 basis points while year to date return further weakened to 7.0 percent. Similarly, investors lost N59.8 billion as market capitalisation stood at N14.8 trillion. The bearish performance was triggered by profit taking in bellwethers – Dangote Cement (-1.2 percent), Seplat Petroleum Development Company (-3.3 percent) and Guaranty Trust Bank (-1.1 percent). However, activity level weakened as volume and value traded fell 28.2 percent and 56.1 percent to 244.9 million units and N4.1 billion respectively. The top traded stocks by volume were Zenith Bank (79.3 billion), Access Bank (19.9 million) and UBA (19.0 million) while Zenith Bank (N2.2 billion), CAP (N356.4 million) and Access Bank (N225.0 million) were the top traded stocks by value.
Sector performance was largely bearish as 3 of 5 indices under our watch trended southwards. The Oil & Gas index led laggards, down 1.8 percent on the back of losses in Seplat Petroleum Development Company (-3.3 percent) and Forte Oil (-2.1 percent). In the same vein, the Consumer Goods and Banking indices shed 0.1 percent and 2bps respectively due to profit taking in Dangote a Sugar (-1.1 percent), NASCON (-2.9 percent), Dangote Flour Mills (-0.9 percent), Guaranty Trust Bank (-1.1 percent) and Wema Bank (-4.6 percent). On the flipside, the Industrial Goods index trended northwards, inching 0.1 percent higher due to gains in Cement Company of Northern Nigeria, CCNN (+10.0 percent) and CAP (+4.9 percent) offsetting profit taking in Dangote Cement (-1.2 percent) while the Insurance index rose 2bps, as a result of gains in Linkage Assurance (+4.6 percent), Lasaco Assurance (+5.1 percent) and Equity Assurance (+3.6 percent).
Investor sentiment measured by market breadth (advance/decline ratio) strengthened, albeit still soft, to 0.9x from 0.8x recorded in the preceding trading session as 22 stocks closed in the green as against 26 stocks that declined. The top gainers were CCNN (+10.0 percent), VERITASKAP (+5.4 percent) and Lasaco Assurance (+5.1 percent) while Niger Insurance (-7.4 percent), Fidson Healthcare (-5.0 percent) and May & Baker (-4.9 percent) declined the most.