By Dipo Olowookere
It is not a good time for Nigerian stocks at the moment as investor sentiment remains negative as the market awaits a positive trigger to propel another round of buying interest.
On Thursday, the Nigerian Exchange (NGX) Limited slightly went down by 0.01 per cent to extend its stay at the negative territory for the fourth straight session. It means the stock market has not recorded a single growth this trading week, though it closed flat on Tuesday with a red.
The decline reported yesterday was majorly influenced by selloffs in some value stocks and investors did not have the opportunity to chew the much-awaited half-year results of GTCO and the financial statements were filed after the close of business.
Business Post reports that the All-Share Index (ASI) reduced at the session by 3.19 points to settle at 39,201.33 points compared with the preceding session’s 39,204.52 points, while the market capitalisation went down by N1 billion to finish at N20.425 trillion in contrast to N20.426 trillion of Wednesday.
Unlike the previous day, the performance of the key sectors of the exchange was better, though it remained mixed, with the energy, consumer goods and banking indices closing higher by 0.55 per cent, 0.14 per cent and 0.03 per cent apiece, while the insurance and industrial goods counters depreciated by 1.65 per cent and 0.02 per cent respectively.
At the exchange on Thursday, there were more price losers than gainers. A total of nine stocks appreciated during the trading day, while 21 equities depreciated in price.
Cornerstone Insurance suffered the heaviest loss with a 7.69 per cent decline, closing at 48 kobo. AIICO Insurance went down by 6.86 per cent to 95 kobo, Learn Africa lost 5.56 per cent to sell for N1.36, Livestock Feeds depreciated by 5.45 per cent to N2.08, while Honeywell Flour Mills shed 5.13 per cent to trade at N3.88.
Conversely, Chams ended the session as the best-performing stock with a price increase of 4.76 per cent to quote at 22 kobo and was followed by UBA, which gained 4.67 per cent to settle at N7.85.
Cutix appreciated by 4.60 per cent to sell at N5.00, Oando rose by 3.08 per cent to trade at N4.68, while Nigerian Breweries improved by 1.25 per cent to N48.65.
In terms of the trades, the volume of shares went down by 1.00 per cent to 350.5 million units from 354.1 million units, the number of deals declined by 13.97 per cent to 3,523 deals from 4,095 deals, while the value of stocks increased by 4.52 per cent to N3.4 billion from N3.2 billion.
For another trading session, FBN Holdings finished as the most transacted stock with the sale of 97.7 million units valued at N729.6 million and was trailed by Wema Bank with 74.8 million units worth N58.5 million.
Access Bank transacted 47.8 million equities valued at N451.2 million, Livestock Feeds sold 12.9 million shares worth N26.7 million, while Nigerian Breweries exchanged 10.0 million stocks for N486.8 million.
Adedapo Adesanya