By Dipo Olowookere
The bearish run on the floor of the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) was put to an end on Wednesday on the back of buying interest in the shares of MTN Nigeria, which led the price gainers’ chart in the day.
Business Post reports that the local equity market appreciated for the first time in a week by 0.19 percent to reduce the year-to-date loss to 15.90 percent as the year-end fast approaches.
At the close of the midweek session, the All-Share Index (ASI) increased by 49.79 points to 26,434.00 points from 26,384.21 points, while the market capitalisation went up by N24 billion to settle at N12.758 trillion against N12.734 trillion of the previous day.
MTN Nigeria added N2 to its share price yesterday to close at N118 per unit and was followed by C&I Leasing, which gained 50 kobo to finish at N5.90 per share.
Flour Mills rose by 30 kobo to close at N19.30 per unit, UBA rose by 25 kobo to end at N6.75 per share, while UAC Nigeria appreciated by 25 kobo to finish at N8.30 per share.
On the losers’ chart, Stanbic IBTC dominated with a loss of 70 kobo to finish at N36.10 per unit, while GTBank trailed after declining by 65 kobo to end at N28 per share.
Chellarams lost 30 kobo during the session to close at N2.78 per unit, FBN Holdings depreciated by 10 kobo to trade at N6.20 per share, while Ecobank went down by 10 kobo to settle at N6.40 per share.
Despite the gains printed by the market yesterday, the level of activity remained low as the volume of trades went down by 8.18 percent to 180.2 million from 196.3 million, while the value depreciated by 14.83 percent to N3.0 billion from N3.6 billion.
UBA was the most active stock at the midweek trading day as the lender sold 29.3 million units of its shares worth N192.7 million, while Zenith Bank traded 19.9 million equities valued at N366.3 million.
Guinness Nigeria exchanged 15.6 million stocks for N460.6 million, GTBank transacted 13.3 million units worth N373.0 million, while Access Bank traded 13.0 million shares valued at N119.4 million.
