Dipo Olowookere
By Dipo Olowookere
The last trading session of the week ended negative on Friday at the domestic stock market after 18 companies had their shares trading lower at the close of business. This depressed the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) by 0.39 percent to extend the year-to-date loss to 13.63 percent.
Nestle Nigeria led the losers’ chart during the session after going down by N45 to finish at N1205 per unit, with Dangote Cement trailing after a loss of N2 to settle at N155.70k per share.
GlaxoSmithKline went down by 75 kobo to close at N7.15k per share, Ecobank depreciated by 55 kobo to end at N7.15k per unit, while Forte Oil also declined by 55 kobo to trade at N14.50k per share.
Business Post reports that during trading yesterday, a total of 16 stocks recorded gains, with Dangote Sugar chalking up more than others by N1 to close at N21 per unit.
Zenith Bank rose by 65 kobo to finish at N18 per share, UAC Nigeria appreciated by 55 kobo to settle at N6.05k per unit, Access Bank grew by 45 kobo to end at N6.90k per share, while Custodian Investment garnered 40 kobo to close at N6.20k per unit.
Despite the poor general performance of the market yesterday, the level of activity improved significantly with the volume of shares transacted rising by 133.43 percent to 311.3 million units from 133.3 million units, and the value improving by 168.21 percent to N6.4 billion from N2.4 billion.
GTBank emerged as the most active stock, trading a total of 129.3 million units of its shares worth N3.4 billion at the market on Friday.
Access Bank followed with 59.6 million units sold for N403.9 million, Zenith Bank traded 31.4 million equities valued at N546.3 million, FBN Holdings transacted 15.3 million shares for N67.0 million, while UBA exchanged 14.6 million stocks worth N88.8 million.
A look at the major market pointers showed that the All-Share Index (ASI) depleted yesterday by 105.52 points to finish at 27,146.57 points, while the market capitalization reduced by N51.3 billion to settle at N13.207 trillion.
