By Dipo Olowookere
It was a bad day for Fidson Healthcare Plc on the floor of the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) on Thursday as its share price depreciated by 10 per cent.
This poor performance occurred on a day information emerged that the company’s N10 billion commercial paper programme was accepted on the trading platform of FMDQ Securities Exchange.
During the trading session, shares of the healthcare firm went down to N4.41 per unit from the previous N4.90 per unit as investors trimmed their stake in the organisation.
Fidson was among the 47 price losers recorded at the market yesterday. It was closely followed by Northern Nigerian Flour Mills, which declined by 9.97 per cent to sell at N6.32 per unit.
Nigerian Enamelware lost 9.95 per cent to trade at N19.90 per share, NEM Insurance depreciated by 9.95 per cent to close at N1.72 per unit, while NCR Nigeria dropped 9.91 per cent to quote at N3.09 per share.
Business Post reports that there were 12 price risers yesterday and University Press led the chart after its value appreciated by 9.91 per cent to trade at N1.22 per unit.
Morison grew by 9.09 per cent to close at 60 kobo per share, CAP gained 5.26 per cent to sell for N20 per unit, Lafarge Africa gained 3.59 per cent to close at N20.20 per unit, while Livestock Feeds grew by 3.17 per cent to N2.28 per share.
Yesterday, only the industrial goods index closed positive as it appreciated by 0.19 per cent, while the insurance, banking, consumer goods and energy sectors depreciated by 4.04 per cent, 1.54 per cent, 1.47 per cent and 0.65 per cent respectively.
For the All-Share Index (ASI), it decreased by 157.39 points to 39,364.67 points from 39,522.06 points, while the market capitalisation depreciated by N82 billion to N20.596 trillion from N20.678 trillion.
On the activity chart, there was an improvement as the trading volume rose by 101.84 per cent to 493.2 million units from 244.3 million units, the trading value increased by 14.40 per cent to N4.7 billion from N4.1 billion, while the number of deals rose by 16.38 per cent to 5,486 deals from 4,714 deals.
Unlike the preceding day, Universal Insurance was the most active stock with the sale of 83.3 million units of its shares valued at N16.7 million.
Zenith Bank dropped to the second position after it sold 38.7 million units worth N983.3 million, FBN Holdings transacted 31.3 million stocks for N216.7 million, UBA traded 26.8 million equities valued at N211.6 million, while Access Bank exchanged 21.6 million shares for N168.1 million.
Adedapo Adesanya 
Modupe Gbadeyanka