Nigerian Stocks Give up 0.04% to Profit-taking

By Dipo Olowookere

A marginal 0.04 per cent loss was suffered by Nigerian stocks on Friday as a result of profit-taking by investors.

It came despite the market breadth index of the Nigerian Exchange (NGX) Limited closing positive on the last trading session of the week.

Yesterday, Customs Street recorded 22 appreciating equities and 21 depreciating equities, representing bullish investor sentiment.

But this did not reflect in the outcome of the exchange on Friday, as the key performance indicators were in the red, with the All-Share Index (ASI) down by 97.64 points to 252,269.16 points from 252,366.80 points, and the market capitalisation down by N63 billion to N163.796 trillion from N163.859 trillion.

Multiverse dropped 9.90 per cent to close at N17.30, LivingTrust Mortgage Bank declined by 9.69 per cent to N2.33, eTranzact lost 8.11 per cent to settle at N17.00, Haldane McCall depreciated by 4.58 per cent to N3.33, and Sovereign Trust Insurance crashed by 3.52 per cent to N2.19.

On the flip side, Caverton jumped by 10.00 per cent to N4.40, Fortis Global Insurance leapt by 9.93 per cent to N1.66, Austin Laz surged by 9.91 per cent to N2.44, Lasaco Assurance rose by 9.20 per cent to N1.90, and Veritas Kapital expanded by 9.00 per cent to N1.09.

The level of activity remained high yesterday, though with fewer transactions and lower value. Market participants transacted 3.7 billion shares worth N23.1 billion in 27,205 deals compared with the 2.9 billion shares valued at N78.7 billion traded in 28,318 deals on Thursday.

This showed that the trading volume surged by 27.59 per cent, the trading value moderated by 70.65 per cent, and the number of deals eased by 3.93 per cent.

Linkage Assurance was the most traded stock, with 3.1 billion units worth N3.7 billion. CMFC exchanged 231.7 million units valued at N395.7 million, First Holdco sold 72.2 million units for N7.3 billion, UBA transacted 57.0 million units worth N2.4 billion, and SUNU Assurances traded 24.3 million units valued at N73.4 million.