By Dipo Olowookere
For the third straight day, activities on the floor of the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) closed bearish on Tuesday by 0.03 percent, shrinking the year-to-date return to 0.03 percent.
This led to the reduction of the All-Share Index (ASI) by 7.93 points to 27,033.10 points from 27,041.03 points and the decline of the market capitalisation by N4 billion to N14.083 trillion from N14.087 trillion.
Business Post reports that the loss printed by the equity market yesterday was influenced by 22 stocks, especially in the insurance and consumer goods sectors, which that their respective counters depreciating by 2.01 percent and 0.38 percent.
The market was looking to close green until the last moment, when it turned red. Only the banking index closed green, rising by 0.11 percent, while the energy and industrial goods indices closed flat.
SFS REIT was the heaviest price loser on Tuesday, depreciating by N7.65 to N69.30 per share, while Nigerian Breweries fell by N1 to settle at N46 per unit.
UPDC REIT went down by 30 kobo to N3.15 per share, Caverton moved down by 24 kobo to N2.70 per unit, while SAHCO declined by 23 kobo to N2.13 per share.
The number of price gainers increased to eight on Tuesday from five on Monday and the leader of the pack at the session was Cadbury Nigeria, which appreciated by 80 kobo to N9 per unit.
Africa Prudential gained 21 kobo on the back of the 70 kobo dividend it declared yesterday. The share price of the company ended yesterday at N5.11 each.
Access Bank garnered 20 kobo to trade at N9 per share, FBN Holdings rose by 15 kobo to N5.45 per unit, while GlaxoSmithKline appreciated by 10 kobo to sell at N4.60 per share.
The volume of transactions yesterday reduced by 43.66 percent to 241.7 million units from 429.0 million units, while the value fell by 51.30 percent to N3.6 billion from N7.3 billion, with the number of deals decreasing by 1.70 percent to 4,456 from 4,533.
It was observed by Business Post that the low prices of some value stocks gave investors the opportunity to expand their portfolios. This caused the mopping up of 43.3 million units of Zenith Bank stocks yesterday worth N827.2 million.
GTBank sold 38.7 million equities valued at N1.0 million, UBA exchanged 28.9 million shares for N196.8 million, Transcorp traded 27.4 million units worth N25.0 million, while UPDC REIT sold 20.2 million stocks valued at N63.5 million.
