NSE LIVE! High-cap stocks depress equities

The underlying positive sentiments at the Nigerian stock market remained large on Wednesday but losses suffered by a handful of highly capitalised stocks overshadowed the overall market position. 

With 18 advancers to 15 decliners, the buying sentiments, especially for low-priced equities, were considerably wide. 

Losses recorded by large-cap stocks such as Nigerian Breweries, Guaranty Trust Bank, Oando and Total Nigeria pushed the two main overall market indices to the negative. 

Both the aggregate market value of all quoted equities at the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) and the All Share Index (ASI) indicated average day-on-day decline of 0.11 per cent, equivalent to a loss of N10 billion.

Aggregate market value of all quoted equities declined from its opening value of N9.361 trillion to close at N9.351 trillion. The ASI dipped from 27,252.48 points to close at 27,223.08 points. The decline nudged the average year-to-date return to -4.95 per cent.

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Total Nigeria led the losers with a loss of N12.50 to close at N332.50. Nigerian Breweries, the second most capitalised stock at the stock market, declined by N1.01 to close at N145. UAC of Nigeria lost 60 kobo to close at N18.60. 

Ecobank Transnational Incorporated dropped by 53 kobo to close at N10.18. Oando declined by 23 kobo to close at N4.47. Guaranty Trust Bank lost 20 kobo to close at N23.60. Flour Mills of Nigeria dropped by 18 kobo to close at N19 while UACN Property Development Company slipped by 15 kobo to close at N2.94 per share.

On the positive side, Lafarge Africa led the gainers with a gain of N2.30 to close at N49.80. MRS Oil and Gas rose by N2.16 to close at N45.51. Guinness Nigeria added N1.91 to close at N84. Union Bank of Nigeria gathered 21 kobo to close at N4.51. Champion Breweries rose by 18 kobo to close at N2.64. Airline Services and Logistics chalked up 11 kobo to close at N2.31 while Vitafoam Nigeria rose by 10 kobo to close at N2.50 per share.

Total turnover stood at 202.7 million shares valued at N1.26 billion in 3,337 deals. FCMB Group was the most active stock with 47.17 million shares valued at N51.44 million. Transnational Corporation of Nigeria followed with 22.3 million shares worth N20.9 million while Guaranty Trust bank ranked third with 19.96 million shares worth N471.7 million.

“Investor sentiment remains majorly driven by third quarter 2016 earnings releases – which have remained broadly unimpressive – hence we expect the bearish trend in the market to persist,” analysts at Afrinvest Securities stated.

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