March 31, 2021/Cordros Report

EQUITIES

The domestic equities market remained bearish, following sell-offs of MTNN (-2.9%) and ZENITHBANK (-0.2%) stocks. Thus, the All-Share Index declined by 0.6% to 39,045.13 points. Accordingly, Month-to-Date and Year-to-Date losses increased to -1.9% and -3.0%, respectively.

The total volume of trades increased by 3.3% to 347.17 million units, valued at NGN2.80 billion, and exchanged in 3,990 deals. WEMABANK was the most traded stock by volume at 94.05 million units, while SEPLAT was the most traded stock by value at NGN519.92 million.

Sectoral performance was mixed, as the Insurance (+2.2%) and Consumer Goods (+0.4%) indices gained, while the Banking (-0.8%) index declined. The Industrial Goods and Oil & Gas indices closed flat.

As measured by market breadth, market sentiment turned negative (0.8x), as 22 tickers lost relative to 18 gainers. DAARCOMM (-8.7%) and WEMABANK (-8.1%) were the top losers of the day, while LINKASSURE (+10.0%) and MEYER (+9.8%) topped the gainers’ list.

CURRENCY

The naira appreciated at the I&E window by 0.1% to NGN408.67/USD but remained flat at NGN486.00/USD in the parallel market.

MONEY MARKET & FIXED INCOME

The overnight lending rate expanded by 208bps to 9.3%, in the absence of any significant inflows to the system.
 
Activities at the NTB secondary market traded in a lull as market participants shifted their focus to today’s primary market proceedings. Thus, the average yield closed flat at 4.1%. Similarly, the OMO secondary market’s average yield was flat at 6.5%.
 
Trading in the Treasury bond secondary market was mixed, as the average yield remained flat at 9.7%. Across the benchmark curve, the average yield was flat at the short and mid segments but expanded slightly at the long (+1bp) end, following sell-off of the JUL-2045 (+5bps) bond.

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