By Yakubu LAAH InvestAdvocate

Lagos (INVESTADVOCATE)-Bulls resurfaced on Monday at the Nigerian equities market as all-share index (ASI) inched up 0.24 percent to close at 49,769 points, while market capitalisation appreciated N31.72 billion to close at N13.46 trillion.

The 0.24 percent gain compared with the 0.21 depreciation recorded the previous session as Year-to-Date (YTD) returns currently stands at a negative of 1.36 percent.

According to analysts at Cordros Capital, the bulls returned to the Nigerian bourse as high demand for industrial goods equities put a halt to the two (2) consecutive losing sessions.

Cordros reported that out of the five (5) NSE sectoral indices, only the industrial goods index reflected the broader market gain, as demand for Dangote Cement Plc, Ashaka Cement Plc and Lafarge Cement WAPCO Nigeria Plc stirred the index to a 1.72 percent gain.

The oil/gas index topped the losers chart with a 2.24 percent decline, the banking index followed with a 1.05 percent drop. While, the consumer goods and insurance indices also lost 0.29 percent and 0.15 percent respectively.

However, market breadth, remained negative as 23 gainers and 35 losers were recorded. Excluding all one-off trades, Volume traded fell by 48.66 percent to 135.45 million shares valued at N1.97 billion and traded in 4.075 deals.

At the end of trading today on the Nigerian bourse, market
turnover closed positive as volume records an uptick of 727.47 percent compared to 1.21 decline recorded the previous session.

Shares of conglomerate Transnational Corporation of Nigeria (Transcorp), Guaranty Trust Bank Plc GTBank and Zenith Bank Plc (Zenith) were the most active to boost market turnover, while GTBank and Zenith topped market value.

‘’We are cautiously optimistic about trading tomorrow as broad losses still indicates some levels of negative sentiment in the market in spite of relatively attractive valuations,’’ the Cordros report said.