By Peter OBIORA InvestAdvocate
Lagos (INVESTADVOCATE)-The Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) on Monday started the week on a bullish note with a marginal gain of 0.01 percent on demand of the shares of Dangote Cement Plc, according to Cordros daily market update.
The report says the NSE all-share index (ASI) closed at 31,446.42 points, while market capitalisation increased by N1.61 billion to close at N10.78 trillion.
According to the report, profit taking ensued on stocks that drove last week’s rally with sell-offs seen in blue-chips like lenders, Zenith Bank Plc, Diamond Bank Plc, United Bank for Africa Plc and on the shares of beer maker, Nigerian Breweries Plc and forte Oil Plc.
Cordros says with today’s marginal gain, current Year-to-Date (Y-t-D) return dropped by 9.26 percent, while the Month-to-Date (M-t-D) return increased to 4.20 percent.
It said three (3) of the five (5) NSE sector indices closed red. “The Banking index had the worst performance with a 1.20 percent decline, the Consumer Goods index followed with a 1.19 percent loss, while the Oil/Gas index dropped 0.47 percent,” the update added.
On the contrary, the Industrial index climbed up slightly by 1.01 percent following a 2.21 percent gain in the price of DANGCEM, while the Insurance index grew 0.04 percent.
At the close of business on the Nigerian bourse, market breadth returned negative with 15 gainers and 27 losers, the NSE market statistics said.
Drug maker, Evans Medical Plc emerged top gainer with a gain of 0.06 kobo per share; while logistics Solutions Company topped the losers chart with a loss of 0.23 kobo per share.
In terms of turnover, volume traded dipped by a significant 72.04% to 146.7 million shares, valued at N1.45 billion and traded in 3,262 deals, Cordros update affirmed.
“We expect the market to lose tomorrow as uncertainties remain,” the report added.
