By Dipo Olowookere
It was another day in the bears’ territory for Nigeria’s stock exchange on Tuesday as it marginally depreciated by 0.01 per cent at the close of transactions.
Mild profit-taking in Zenith Bank, Access Bank, Axa Mansard and 12 other equities contributed to the loss recorded at the trading session.
Business Post reports that the bargain hunting in GTCO, FBN Holdings, Oando, Lafarge Africa and 10 others could not save the Nigerian Exchange (NGX) Limited from going down on Tuesday.
When trading activities were brought to an end, the All-Share Index (ASI) went down by 5.34 points to 38,858.99 points from 38,864.33 points, while the market capitalisation shrank by N3 billion to N20.246 trillion from N20.249 trillion.
On the trading day, the insurance and banking sectors depreciated by 3.39 per cent and 0.30 per cent apiece, while the consumer goods, energy and industrial goods counters appreciated by 0.10 per cent, 0.04 per cent and 0.02 per cent respectively.
Axa Mansard led the losers’ gang on Tuesday with a 9.70 per cent loss to close at N2.70, Africa Prudential fell by 8.59 per cent to N5.85, Regency Alliance went down by 6.82 per cent to 41 kobo, Tripple Gee dropped 6.25 per cent to 90 kobo, while Courtville slumped by 5.71 per cent to 33 kobo.
On the flip side, Skyway Aviation topped the gainers’ group with a price appreciation of 9.88 per cent to trade at N4.45, Wema Bank gained 5.13 per cent to sell for 82 kobo, Flour Mills rose by 1.87 per cent to N29.90, United Capital jumped by 1.75 per cent to N8.70, while Jaiz Bank grew by 1.72 per cent to 59 kobo.
It was observed that a total of 526.3 million shares worth N3.1 billion were traded in 3,535 deals on Tuesday in contrast to the 139.5 million shares worth N1.7 billion transacted in 3,539 deals on Monday, signifying that the trading volume rose by 277.40 per cent, the trading value increased by 77.78 per cent, while the number of deals went down by 0.11 per cent.
Honeywell Flour was the most active stock yesterday as it transacted 402.2 million units valued at N1.5 billion and was trailed by UBA, which exchanged 11.1 million units worth N82.7 million.
Further, Transcorp traded 9.5 million shares valued at N8.7 million, Fidelity Bank transacted 9.2 million equities worth N22.4 million, while Wema Bank sold 8.7 million stocks for N6.8 million.
