By Peter OBIORA InvestAdvocate

Lagos (INVESTADVOCATE) – The Nigerian Stock Exchange all share index (NSE ASI) on Tuesday plunged 4.2 percent amidst sell-offs to close at 32,522.31 points, while market capitalisation dipped by N470 billion to close at N10.77 trillion.

The plunge took the Year-To-Date (Y-t-D) and Month-To-Date (M-t-D) returns to a negative 6.16 percent respectively; and the loss is the most on a closing basis since March 2010.

Cordros report affirmed that all of the five (5) NSE Sectoral indices dipped for the first time since 16 December 2014. It said the Consumer Goods index showcased the worst performance with 5.89 percent depreciation, while the Banking and Industrial Goods indices followed with 3.47 percent and 2.77 percent declines respectively.

Similarly, the Oil/Gas and Insurance indices came last with 2.02 percent and 1.65 percent losses respectively.

In terms of market breadth, the Nigerian bourse ended the session on a negative note as it recorded 13 gainers and 42 losers.

Heavy machinery and auto dealers, RT Briscoe (Nigeria) Plc emerged top gainers with a gain of 0.08 kobo, while beer makers, Nigerian Breweries Plc topped the losers table with a loss of N15.83, thereby falling 9.71 percent for the biggest one-day decline since December 2004.

Turnover at the Nigerian equities market shows that volume traded increased by 38.19 percent to 413.76 million shares, valued at N5.31 billion and traded in 3,764 deals; amounting to 66 percent of the three-month daily average.

‘’The negative run is expected to continue as positive catalysts remains unseen,’’ the Cordros report said.