By InvestAdvocate
Lagos (INVESTADVOCATE)-Unrelenting bears on Monday pulled down the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) as all-share index (ASI) dipped 2.86 percent to close at 24,649.39 basis points, while market capitalisation sank by N233.45 billion to N8.48 trillion.
“Today’s poor performance reflects market reaction to the potential exclusion of Nigerian equities from MSCI Frontier Markets index,” Cordros daily market update affirmed.
The update says Monday’s uninspiring performance increased the Month-to-Date and Year-to-Date losses to 2.60 percent and 13.94 percent respectively.
According to the report, the Banking index declined 3.75 percent to suffer the biggest loss, owing to price depreciations in the shares of Nigeria’s top tier lenders, Zenith Bank Plc, Guaranty Trust Bank Plc and financial HoldCo, FBN Holdings Plc by 4.20 percent, 2.10 percent and 1.20 percent apiece.
Similarly, Cordros reports that sell-offs in the shares of Dangote Cement Plc and beermaker, Nigerian Breweries Plc by 4.79 percent and 4.46 percent respectively, saw the Industrial and Consumer Goods sectors drop by 2.80 percent and 1.71 percent accordingly.
On the positive side, the Insurance and Oil & Gas indices appreciated by 1.60 percent and 0.02 percent each, boosted by positive investor sentiments in the shares of reinsurer, Continental Reinsurance Plc and oil marketer, Oando Plc by 4.21 percent and 0.25 percent respectively.
At the close of today’s session, market breadth worsened, with 14 gainers versus 25 losers, according to the NSE’s weekly stock market statistics. Oil services firm, Caverton Offshore Support Group Plc emerged the top gainer with a gain of 0.07 kobo per share and chemical producer, Nigerian-German Chemicals Plc topped the losers chart with a loss of 0.41 kobo per share.
In terms of turnover, total volume traded on the Nigerian bourse marginally increased by 0.84 percent to 225.29 million shares valued at N750.23 million and traded in 3,058 deals.
“With today’s activities (e.g negative market breadth and weak sentiments across major counters) strongly reflecting weaker appetites, we expect the market to remain unimpressive in tomorrow’s session. We however opine that losses will come in less than today’s,” Cordros affirmed.
