By Modupe Gbadeyanka
Profit taking by investors on the trading floor of the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) left the market to close 2.68 percent lower on Wednesday.
Today’s fall was mainly influenced by heavy losses recorded by some blue-chip stocks including Dangote Cement and others.
Specifically, Dangote Cement lost N11 of its share value to close at N214 per share, while Total Plc declined by N9.55k to finish at N227 per share.
Furthermore, Nigerian Breweries depreciated by N5 to end at N185 per share, Guinness Nigeria went down by N1.93k to settle at N87.96k per share, and Stanbic IBTC sank by N1.92k to wrap the day at N37.3k per share.
Business Post reports that the loss recorded today at the market plunged the All-Share Index (ASI) below the 37,000 mark, closing at 36,102.38 points after depreciating by 994.22 points.
The loss further trimmed the YTD return to 34.34 percent.
Market capitalisation slumped today by N342.7 billion to settle at N12.4 trillion, while the market breadth ended negative with 10 gains and 30 losses.
A look at the gainers log showed Nestle leading with an addition of N11.90k to its share price to close at N1,220 per share.
It was trailed by NASCON, which went up by 31k to finish at N12 per share, and Union Bank of Nigeria, which advanced by 21k to end the day at N6 per share.
Dangote Sugar rose by 13k to finish at N12.80k per share, while Vitafoam expanded by 12k to settle at N2.83k per share.
Like the previous day, banking stocks were investors’ delight as FBN Holdings traded 34.5 million shares at N206.8 million.
Access Bank continued to attract attention as investors await their half year earning. But at the close of activities today, it transacted 27.4 million shares at N276.9 million, and GTBank exchanged 25.2 million shares worth N970.8 million.
In addition, Jaiz Bank traded 15.1 million shares valued at N12 million, while Zenith Bank transacted 12.7 million shares at N284.7 million.
By the time transactions were brought to an end on Wednesday at the stock market, investors had exchanged a total of 225 million shares worth N5.1 billion executed in 4,822 deals.
