By Dipo Olowookere
A marginal growth of 0.02 per cent was recorded at the Nigerian stock market on Friday on the back of a sustained bargain hunting in consumer goods and industrial goods equities.
This pushed the consumer goods and the industrial goods sectors higher by 0.13 per cent and 0.11 per cent respectively, while the insurance, energy and banking counters depreciated by 0.57 per cent, 0.12 per cent and 0.01 per cent apiece.
At the close of transactions, the All-Share Index (ASI) grew by 8.82 points to 39,261.01 points from 39,252.19 points, while the market capitalisation increased by N5 billion to N20.456 trillion from N20.451 trillion.
Neimeth ended the session as the highest gaining stock with 7.57 per cent appreciation to N1.99, Transcorp rose by 5.62 per cent to 94 kobo, UPDC gained 4.68 per cent to sell for N1.79, Sovereign Trust Insurance appreciated by 4.00 per cent to 26 kobo, while Flour Mills improved by 3.99 per cent to N30.00.
On the reverse side, Mutual Benefits Assurance suffered the biggest loss, going down by 9.68 per cent to close at 28 kobo and was trailed by FTN Cocoa, which fell by 8.16 per cent to 45 kobo.
NPF Microfinance Bank depreciated by 7.89 per cent to N1.75, Honeywell Flour fell by 5.13 per cent to N3.70, while Chams declined by 4.55 per cent to 21 kobo.
Business Post reports that when the market closed for the session, 13 stocks were on the gainers’ chart, while 16 stocks were on the losers’ table.
In terms of the level of activity, the trading volume went down by 31.22 per cent to 180.3 million units from 262.1 million units, the trading value fell by 13.76 per cent to N1.7 billion from N2.0 billion, while the number of deals depleted by 20.15 per cent to 3,158 deals from 3,955 deals.
Transcorp was the most traded stock with 20.5 million units worth N18.7 million, Access Bank transacted 18.5 million units valued at N170.5 million, Unity Bank exchanged 15.3 million units valued at N7.9 million, Mutual Benefits transacted 11.8 million units worth N3.4 million, while FBN Holdings traded 11.8 million units for N88.0 million.
