By Dipo Olowookere
The Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) depreciated for the fourth consecutive session on Thursday as investors continue to sell off to stay on the sidelines as the general elections draw closer.
The market went down by 1.89 percent to further take the year-to-date loss to 2.78 percent at the close of business.
While the All-Share Index (ASI) depreciated by 588.14 points to finish at 30,557.30 points, the market capitalisation went down by N219.3 billion to settle at N11.395 trillion.
An analysis of the sectoral performance showed that the major indices closed underwater; the banking index lost 2.54 percent, insurance index fell by 1.43 percent, the consumer goods index declined by 1.71 percent, the industrial goods index shed 0.97 percent, while the oil & gas index lost 0.39 percent.
Dangote Cement, which topped the losers’ log, went down by N4 to settle at N190 per share, while Nigerian Breweries also lost N4 to finish at N74 per unit.
Julius Berger declined by N2 to close at N26 per share, Stanbic IBTC reduced by N1.80k to end at N45.20k per share, while Unilever Nigeria shed N1.55k to quote at N35 per share.
Conversely, Vitafoam emerged as the best performing stock, adding 30 kobo to its share value to finish at N4.80k per unit.
It was followed by CAP, which rose by 25 kobo to settle at N31.75k per share, and Learn Africa, which improved by 11 kobo to end at N1.37k per share.
Union Bank appreciated by 5 kobo to finish at N6.25k per share, while Sterling Bank advanced by 4 kobo to settle at N2.39k per share.
At the market yesterday, the total volume and value of stocks increased by 39.98 percent and 11.83 percent to finish at 343.3 million and N3.5 billion respectively, while the number of deals executed also increased by 5.17 percent to 4,228 from 4,020.
The top five most traded stocks were UBA (123.7 million units), Transcorp (33.2 million), Custodian Investment (32.9 million), Zenith Bank (27.6 million) and FBN Holdings (19.8 million).
