By Modupe Gbadeyanka
The first trading day of year 2019 on the floor of the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) started on a bearish note on Wednesday, January 02, 2019.
The local bourse suffered a N135 billion as a result of profit taking by investors, leaving the market capitalisation to close at N11.586 trillion and the All-Share Index at 31,070.06 points after a decline of 360.44 points or 1.15 percent.
During the trading day, losses were recorded by high-cap equities led by Nestle Nigeria, which went down by N10 to settle at N1475 per share.
Nigerian Breweries declined by N7.20k to finish at N78.30k per share, Dangote Cement fell by N3.70k to end at N186 per share, Flour Mills depreciated by 90 kobo to close at N22.20k per share, while Forte Oil lost 70 kobo to finish at N28 per share.
On the flip side, Julius Berger topped the gainers’ chart on the first trading day after a price appreciation of N2 to settle at N22.10k per share.
International Breweries grew by N1 to finish at N31.50k per share, while Custodian Investment rose by 45 kobo to end at N6.10k per share.
Vitafoam appreciated by 42 kobo to close at N4.82k per share, while Ecobank went up by 30 kobo to settle at N14.30k per share.
Also at the market yesterday, the volume of shares transacted by investors declined by 76.93 percent from 929.3 million to 214.4 million, while the value reduced by 60.47 percent from N4 billion to N1.6 billion.
Diamond Bank was the most traded stock on Wednesday with a total turnover of 50.7 million units sold for N112 million.
It was followed by Sovereign Trust Insurance, which exchanged 33 million shares worth N6.7 million, and Access Bank, which transacted 20.8 million equities valued at N136.2 million.
Zenith Bank sold 18 million shares for N413.6 million, while FBN Holdings exchanged 11.3 million equities worth N88.6 million.
Adedapo Adesanya