Nigerian Exchange Down 0.71% as Selling Pressure Intensifies

By Dipo Olowookere

Persistent profit-taking and cautious trading by investors further weakened the Nigerian Exchange (NGX) Limited on Friday by 0.71 per cent after a three-day break from the market.

The stock exchange was closed for three days on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday as a result of the public holidays declared by the federal government for Eid el-Fitr.

Traders were not enthusiastic yesterday as the economic parameters were not impressive, leading to further sell-offs.

At the close of transactions, the All-Share Index (ASI) was down by 732.67 points to 102,314.56 points from 103,047.23 points, and the market capitalisation depleted by N412 billion to N57.865 trillion from N58.277 trillion.

Business Post reports that the banking index fell by 4.67 per cent during the session, the insurance space crashed by 2.45 per cent, the consumer goods sector depreciated by 1.07 per cent, the energy index weakened by 0.28 per cent, and the industrial goods counter crumbled by 0.23 per cent.

The market breadth index was negative on Friday as a result of 37 equities closing on the losers’ chart and 12 equities on the gainers’ table, indicating a bearish investor sentiment.

Dangote Sugar and GTCO were the worst-performing shares yesterday due to the 10.00 per cent loss posted by each of them, closing at N53.10, and N41.40, respectively.

Dangote Cement depreciated by 9.99 per cent to N618.10, Flour Mills plunged by 9.87 per cent to N33.80 and Multiverse deflated by 9.84 per cent to N13.75.

Conversely, Transcorp was the best-performing stock after it gained 9.93 per cent to trade at N14.95, Morison Industries rose by 9.87 per cent to N2.56, Oando appreciated by 9.61 per cent to N12.55, Caverton jumped by 8.54 per cent to N1.78, and Deap Capital grew by 7.94 per cent to 68 Kobo.

It was observed that the bourse was busy yesterday as the trading volume, value, and the number of deals surged by 198.50 per cent, 575.00 per cent, and 135.59 per cent, respectively.

This was because when trading activities ended for the session, investors traded 734.0 million equities worth N21.6 billion in 12,491 deals compared with the 245.9 million equities worth N3.2 billion traded on Monday in 5,302 deals.