FOLLOWING price losses suffered by major blue chip stocks, equity transactions continued on a downward note yesterday, causing market capitalisation to drop further by N75 billion.

Specifically, the All-Share Index dipped by 234.39 points or 1.04 per cent, to close at 22,313.23, from the opening index of 22,547.62.

Also, the market capitalisation lost massively by N75 billion to close at N7.137 trillion, against the N7.212 trillion recorded on Monday.

On the activity chart, 258.81 million shares valued N3.02 billion were traded in 4,538 deals, against 183.60 million shares valued N1.67 billion traded in 3,545 deals, on August 22.

Conoil topped the gainers’ pack, appreciating by 4.98 per cent to close at N34.36 per share.

NCR grew by 4.75 per cent to close at N3.75 per share, while EcoBank rose by 13 kobo to close at N2.89 per share.

On the other hand, PZ Cussons led the price losers’ table, depreciating by 4.98 per cent to close at N29.75 per share.

The banking sub-sector still remained the most active sub-sector, trading 183.49 million shares worth N1.04 billion in 2,800 deals.

The insurance sub-sector followed with 29.02 million shares valued at N21.63 million traded in 153 deals.

Robust trading in the shares of Goldlink Insurance drove the sub-sector with 12.96 million shares worth N6.48 million in nine deals.

The breweries sub-sector ranked third, trading 16.59 million shares worth N1.43 billion in 236 deals. The shares of Nigerian Breweries Plc boosted trading in the sub-sector with investors staking N1.39 billion on 16.44 million shares in 164 deals.

Meanwhile, for the year ended December 2010, Guinea Insurance Plc, yesterday, announced Gross Premium of N1.012 billion compared with N1.0169 billion in 2009, while profit after tax stood at N106.002 million, compared with N13.394 million in 2009.

By Moses Ebosele and Helen Oji

Source: Guardian