NSE LIVE! Equities remain down as selloff persists

For the second consecutive trading session, Nigerian equities continued on the downtrend on Wednesday as investors sought to rebalance their portfolios in view of recent price changes and corporate earnings.

Benchmark indices at the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) showed an average day-on-day decline of 0.17 per cent, equivalent to net capital loss of N16 billion. The decline on Wednesday raised the negative average year-to-date return to -5.06 per cent.

Aggregate market value of all quoted equities declined from its opening value of N8.843 trillion to close at N8.827 trillion. The All Share Index (ASI), the common index that tracks prices at the Exchange, also declined from 25,558.57 points to close at 25,514.09 points.

With 22 losers to 15 gainers, most sectoral indices also closed on the downside. The NSE Consumer Goods Index declined by 0.6 per cent. The NSE Oil & Gas Index slipped by 0.3 per cent. The NSE Banking Index and the NSE Insurance Index declined by 0.2 per cent each. However, the NSE Industrial Goods Index played the contrarian with a gain of 2.0 per cent.

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Nestle Nigeria, NSE’s highest priced stock, led the losers with a loss of N10 to close at N740. Total Nigeria followed with a drop of N2.10 to close at N272.90. Unilever Nigeria declined by N1.70 to close at N32.30. Mobil Oil Nigeria dropped by 99 kobo to close at N298. Stanbic IBTC Holdings lost 80 kobo to close at N17.70 while International Breweries dropped by 70 kobo to close at N15 per share.

Total turnover stood at 198.83 million shares valued at N2.53 billion in 2,306 deals. Banking stocks dominated the top activities chart. United Bank for Africa was the most active stock with 64.5 million shares valued at N343.5 million. Guaranty Trust Bank followed with 29.44 million shares valued at N783.7 million while Access Bank placed third with 24.45 million shares worth N151.49 million.

On the positive side, Guinness Nigeria led the gainers with a gain of N2.61 to close at N62.64. Julius Berger Nigeria followed with a gain of N1.95 to close at N41.95. Lafarge Africa rose by N1.80 to close at N37.80. CAP added 19 kobo to close at N28.20 while Zenith Bank and Custodian and Allied chalked up 15 kobo each to close at N13.80 and N3.31 respectively.

Most analysts said they expected the market to continue on the downtrend in the next few trading sessions.

“Following the rally recorded in the previous week, profit taking remains the key driver of market performance this week. We expect this to persist in the interim,” Afrinvest Securities stated.

SCM Capital Markets stated that it expects “a bearish mood at tomorrow`s (Thursday) session due to the prevalent weak market sentiments”.

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