By Peter OBIORA InvestAdvocate

Lagos (INVESTADVOCATE)-The Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) all-share index (ASI) on Thursday recorded its lowest loss in five (5) years to 20 percent from its 2014 high, heading for a bear market.

The NSE ASI declined 4.07 percent to close at 34,494.93 basis points, while market capitalisation lost 484.74 billion to close at N11.43 trillion, in response to sustained selling pressure, according to Cordros report.

Current Year-to-Date (YTD) returns at the Nigerian bourse stands at a negative 16.54 percent.

With this development at the end of transactions,  the Nigerian equities market went down in one of the longest losing streak to nine (9) consecutive sessions since January 2009; thereby hitting the highest one-day loss in more than four (4) years.

Cordros say sustained sell-offs saw the NSE ASI shed the most since 19th March 2010. ‘’This decline came on the back of OPEC’s decision to cut oil demand forecast,’’ the report said.

Market breadth ended woefully as the NSE recorded five (5) gainers and 49 losers. Nigerian Aviation Handling Company (NAHCO) led the gainers chart, while cement manufacture Lafarge Wapco Nigeria Plc led the losers table.

In terms of sectoral performance, all of the five (5) NSE sectoral indices mirrored the broader markets performance. ‘’Once again the industrial goods index topped the losers chart with a significant 6.57 percent loss, the oil/gas index followed with a 5.70 percent, while the consumer goods, banking and insurance indices also lost by, 4.14 percent, 3.51 percent and 2.10 percent respectively,’’ the report affirmed.

Similarly, market turnover shows that volume traded climbed up 231.66 percent to 1.33billion shares, worth N8.37billion and traded in 4,188 deals, compared to a negative 46.83 percent reported in the previous session.

‘’We posit a positive outcome in tomorrow’s trading session, as we expect investors to capitalise on fallen share prices,’’ the Cordros report said.