Nigerian Equities Open Week Bearish With Marginal Loss

By Dipo Olowookere

The first trading day of the new week started on a negative note on Monday on the floor of the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE). The equity market ended the day with a marginal 0.04 percent loss following the weakening of the share prices of 17 companies listed on the platform.

Consequently, the All-Share Index (ASI) went down by 11.56 points to close at 26,990.59 points, while the market capitalisation reduced by N5.6 billion to settle at N13.027 trillion.

The activity level was mixed during the day as the volume of shares traded increased by 8.51 percent to 246.5 million from 22.7.2 million, while the value of trades decreased by 33.42 percent to N2.4 billion from N3.7 billion, and the number of trades declining by 4.71 percent to 3,093 deals from 3,246 deals.

FCMB was the most transacted stock at the market on Monday. Last week, the company released its financial statements for the third quarter of 2019 and the numbers were not too impressive. Yesterday, 97.8 million units of the stocks were sold for N186.0 million.

Zenith Bank traded 21.8 million units worth N406.8 million, FBN Holdings exchanged 15.2 million shares for N102.8 million, Nigerian Breweries traded 12.1 million shares valued at N614.9 million, while UBA transacted 12.0 million stocks worth N84.2 million.

CCNN was the worst performing stock at the market on Monday, shedding N1 to close at N19 per unit and was trailed by UAC Nigeria, which declined by 70 kobo to finish at N7.30 per share.

GlaxoSmithKline depreciated by 25 kobo to end at N6 per share, GTBank fell by 15 kobo to settle at N30.30 per share, while FCMB decreased by 11 kobo to trade at N1.90 per unit.

At the other side, Unilever Nigeria gained N1.60 to finish at N17.70 per share and was trailed by International Breweries, which rose by 60 kobo to finish at N10 per unit.

Dangote Cement improved by 20 kobo to close at N143 per share, Axa Mansard increased by 10 kobo to finish at N1.80 per share, while Sterling Bank appreciated by 80 kobo to end at N2.05 per unit.