By Dipo Olowookere
The first trading session on the floor of the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) after the Easter break closed bearish on Tuesday as the market depreciated by 0.39 per cent.
Business Post reports that investors embarked on sell-offs ostensibly to have some funds after the holiday spending and this affected the overall performance of the equity market yesterday.
It was observed that most of the equities affected were the high-cap like Zenith Bank, Guinness Nigeria, Lafarge Africa, BUA Cement, GTBank, amongst others. A total of 21 stocks declined in the day compared with the 14 stocks, which appreciated.
At the close of transactions, apart from the industrial goods sector, which closed flat, every other counter ended bearish with the banking losing 1.67 per cent, insurance declining by 0.53 per cent, consumer goods decreasing by 0.39 per cent and energy shedding 0.11 per cent.
For the All-Share Index (ASI), it went down by 150.13 points to end at 38,766.61 points as against the previous session’s 38,916.74 points, while the market capitalisation dropped N78 billion to finish at N20.283 trillion versus N20.361 trillion it closed before the break.
At the market yesterday, investors traded 224.6 million stocks worth N2.1 billion in 4,675 deals compared with the 239.4 million stocks worth N2.3 billion transacted in 4,450 deals on the prior trading day.
This indicated that the number of shares traded on Tuesday reduced by 6.19 per cent, the value of the transactions went down by 7.43 per cent, while the number of deals increased by 5.06 per cent.
UAC Nigeria closed the session as the most active stock with the sale of 34.1 million units valued at N337.6 million and was trailed by Access Bank, which sold 26.4 million units worth N214.9 million.
FBN Holdings transacted 18.9 million equities valued at N137.4 million, Zenith Bank sold 16.6 million stocks for N364.3 million, while Fidelity Bank exchanged 15.3 million shares worth N39.2 million.
On the price movement chart, MRS Oil Nigeria was the worst-performing stocks yesterday with a price depreciation of 9.92 per cent to close at N10.90.
Aluminium Extrusion lost 9.88 per cent to close at N7.30, Consolidated Hallmark Insurance dropped 9.38 per cent to 29 kobo, Sterling Bank went down by 8.65 per cent to N1.69, while Guinness Nigeria fell by 8.08 per cent to N33.
The best-performing equity of the day was Eterna as its share price grew by 9.91 per cent to N5.99 and was followed by Linkage Assurance, which gained 9.72 per cent to sell for 79 kobo.
Royal Exchange grew by 9.09 per cent to 36 kobo, Japaul appreciated by 8.89 per cent to 49 kobo, while FCMB gained 4.59 per cent to trade at N2.96.
Adedapo Adesanya