The bears dominated the market as the Nigerian bourse recorded a loss for the second consecutive trading day as the All Share Index (ASI) shed 1.0% to close at 28,009.40 points, driving Year to Date loss of the benchmark index to 2.2%.
Market capitalization also decreased N94.3bn to settle at N9.6tn. Today’s performance was majorly dragged by sell pressures on DANGCEM (-1.1%), GUARANTY (-3.6%), ZENITH (-3.7%) and FORTE (-4.5 %).
However, activity level was mixed as volume traded waned 5.5% to 187.2m units while value traded increased 11.8% to N1.5bn.
All Sector Indices Close in Red Save for Insurance Index
Performance across sectors was broadly bearish today as all sector indices closed in red save for the Insurance index which advanced 7bps on account of gains in AIICO (+1.2%). The Banking index contracted the most, shedding 2.3% as a result of depreciation in GUARANTY (-3.6%) and ZENITH(-3.7%). The Oil & Gas index followed closely, declining 1.4% against the backdrop of declines inFORTE (-4.5%) and CONOIL (-0.3%). Likewise, the Industrial and Consumer Goods indices slid 0.6% and 0.4% as losses in DANGCEM (-1.1%), PZ (-9.7%), and UNILEVER (-2.3%) weighed on both indices.
Investor Sentiment Improves
Investor sentiment remains soft as reflected in today’s market breadth which settled at 0.9x (an improvement from 0.6x on Tuesday) with 22 stocks declining against 20 advancing stocks.
The best performing stocks were FCMB (+6.3%), DIAMOND (+5.0%) and OKOMUOIL (+5.0%) while PZ (-9.7%),CAVERTON (-8.6%) and FLOURMILL (-5.0%) declined the most. We expect the market to mostly trade sideways in the remaining sessions of the week as investors anticipate earnings results for Q3:2016.
Adapted from Afrinvest
