By Dipo Olowookere
The nation’s stock exchange recorded a 0.71 percent gain on Monday to put a halt to the bearish trend at the market in the past three consecutive trading sessions.
Business Post reports that the release of the financial statements of Zenith Bank for the half year ended June 30, 2019 was one of the factors responsible for the return of the bears to the market coupled with the release of GTBank H1 2019 results last Friday.
At yesterday’s session, the All-Share Index (ASI) of the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) appreciated by 190.6 points to finish at 27,115.89 points against the previous close of 26,925.29 points.
In the same vein, the market capitalisation increased on Monday by N93 billion to settle at N13.214 trillion on contrast to N13.121 trillion it ended in the previous trading day.
It was observed that highly capitalised equities on the local bourse buoyed the market performance yesterday, with MTN Nigeria taking the lead after adding N3.70k to its share value to quote at N138.70k per unit
Also gaining on Monday were Stanbic IBTC, which rose by N1 to finish at N34 per share, and Dangote Cement, which appreciated by 50 kobo to settle at N164.50k per unit. In addition, Zenith Bank improved its share price by 40 kobo yesterday to close at N17 each, while Dangote Flour chalked up 35 kobo to end at N21 per share.
At the other side, Nestlé Nigeria topped the losers’ chart on Monday with a price depreciation of N29.10k to finish at N1113.90k per share.
It was trailed by Cadbury Nigeria, which lost N1 to close at N9.30k per unit, and Dangote Sugar, which went down by 50 kobo to end at N9.10k each. Also, Lafarge Africa depreciated by 25 kobo yesterday to finish at N13.75k per share, while Axa Mansard depleted by 10 kobo to close at N1.70k per unit.
On the activity chart, the volume of transactions reduced on Monday by 2.92 percent to 250.7 million from 258.3 million recorded last Friday, while the value of trades increased by 18.10 percent to N4.2 billion from N3.5 billion.
A further analysis showed that financial stocks topped table with 126.3 million shares exchanged for N1.1 billion, with industrial goods shares following with 50.2 million units worth N1.1 billion.
At the market yesterday, Lafarge Africa was the most active equity, closing with a turnover of 47.2 million shares sold for N660 million.
Transcorp traded 41.1 million shares worth N37 million, Zenith Bank exchanged 26.7 million equities valued at N452.6 million, UBA transacted 17.2 million units for N97.4 million, while FBN Holdings traded 16.5 million shares worth N77.6 million.
Adedapo Adesanya