Nigerian Stocks Begin Week With 1.22% Rise

By Modupe Gbadeyanka

It was a good start for the local equities market on Monday after the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) recorded a 1.22 percent growth as investors take position on stocks trading at attractive prices.

This rise came as the NSE kicked off its new pricing methodology and par value rule yesterday, which saw prices of some stocks such as Red Star and LASACO, which had traded at the old price floor of 50 kobo, depreciate to 48 kobo at the close of business.

The market breadth on Monday closed positive with 42 price gainers and 12 price losers, while the year-to-date return stood at 15.85 percent.

Also, the All-Share Index (ASI) rose by 532.72 points yesterday to settle at 44,306.48 points, while the market capitalisation appreciated by N191 billion to finish at 15.883 trillion.

However, the volume and value of shares transacted by investors at the market depreciated by 39.32 percent and 17.50 percent respectively.

A total of 573.4 million equities worth N5.9 billion were traded on Monday in contrast to 944.9 million stocks valued at N7.1 billion exchanged at the last trading session.

At the close of trading activities yesterday, the Financial Services sector led the activity chart with 477.8 million shares exchanged for N4.2 billion, while the Consumer Goods sector followed with 52.6 million shares traded for N944 million.

FCMB emerged the most traded stock at the market on Monday, exchanging a total of 169 million units valued at N547 million.

It was trailed by Access Bank, which sold 42.5 million equities worth N553.5 million, and UBA, which exchanged 39.5 million shares valued at N513.7 million.

Honeywell Flour transacted 33.7 million shares for N91.5 million, while Zenith Bank sold 32.8 million shares worth N1 billion.

On the price movement chart, Dangote Cement topped the gainers’ chart after growing by N7.90k to close at N268 per share.

Stanbic IBTC increased by N1 to settle at N45 per share, while Forte Oil appreciated by 60k to finish at N50 per share.

UAC of Nigeria also rose by 60k to close at N17.60k per share, while Eterna increased by                43k to settle at N5.89k per share.

On the flip side, Guinness Nigeria emerged the biggest price loser, depreciating by N2 to close at N110 per share.

It was followed by Nigerian Breweries, which declined by N1.80k to finish at N150 per share, and Dangote Sugar, which fell by N1 to end at N20.95k per share.

Flour Mills of Nigeria went down by 50k to finish at N30.90k per share, while GTBank slumped by 30k to settle at N48.70k per share.