Equities market rebounds with N1tn investor gain

The Nigerian Exchange Limited continued its bullish trading on Thursday, as the All-Share Index rose by 1.08 per cent to close at 146,981.17 points.

Investors also recouped some of their losses from the recent downturn, as the market capitalisation rose by N1.00tn to settle at N93.48tn.

The PUNCH reported that the NGX returned to the green zone on Wednesday, as both the ASI and market cap rose by 2.88 per cent to 145,403.83 points and N92.48tn, respectively. This trading pattern handed a gain of N2.59tn to investors. On Tuesday, the equities market had crashed by 5.01 per cent in what some analysts described as the worst decline since 2010, closing at 141,327.30 points. Investors also recorded a daily loss of N4.64tn, with only four stocks appreciating and 61 settling on the losers’ chart.

Despite strengthening its bullish trend, trading activities were weaker compared to the previous day, as the number of deals dropped by 3.40 per cent to 23,675 exchanges, volume declined by 25.63 per cent to 599.71 million units valued at N22.69bn, indicating a 55.30 per cent decline in the value of traded stocks. Market sentiment remained mostly positive, with 56 gainers and 10 losers. The gainers chart was led by Custodian (+10.00 per cent) and Linkage Assurance (+10.00 per cent). Wema Bank led the volume charts with 98.4 million units (16.4 per cent of total volume) traded, while Zenith Bank led the value chart with N2.6bn (11.6 per cent of total value) worth of trades.

In terms of sectoral performance, the Insurance (+4.58 per cent) and Banking (+3.80 per cent) indices led Thursday’s rendition, propelled by strong demand for AIICO (+9.88 per cent) and Zenith Bank (+8.42 per cent), respectively. The Consumer Goods (+1.73 per cent) and Oil & Gas (+0.65 per cent) indices followed, as price gains in International Breweries (+9.63 per cent) and Oando (+9.97 per cent) drove upticks in their respective indices.

The Commodity Goods index closed flat. On the other hand, the Industrial Goods (-0.09 per cent) index was dragged down by a decline in WAPCO (-0.70 per cent).

Analysts say that the decline in trading activities reflected muted institutional involvement in the market, unlike the previous session.

Source: https://punchng.com/equities-market-rebounds-with-n1tn-investor-gain