NSE LIVE! Investors lose N107b in 5 hours

Most investors had expected it to be five hours of hopes and recovery after losing N245 billion last week, the first trading session of this week left most investors with gloomy faces as strong sell down across the sectors shaved off N107 billion from their investments.

The downtrend at the Nigerian stock market worsened yesterday. The selling pressure built across both the low, medium and highly capitalised stocks, turning the market almost into a free fall. For the sixth consecutive trading sessions, most equities closed on the negative.

With nearly three decliners for every gainer, aggregate market value of all quoted companies on the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) dropped from N9.670 trillion to close at N9.563 trillion, indicating a loss of N107 billion or 1.10 per cent.

The benchmark index at the stock market, the All Share Index (ASI)-a value-based index that tracks prices of all quoted stocks, also indicated a day-on-day decline of 1.10 per cent to close at 27,820.49 points as against its opening index of 28,131.28 points. This further underscored that the N107 billion loss was due solely to declines in share prices rather than any statutory or regulatory adjustments.

The steep decline yesterday pushed the negative average year-to-date return to -19.73 per cent, firmly placing equities on the path of negative closure for 2015. Even with a strong recovery, a mix of profit-taking might not allow the market to override the negative average year-to-date return within the remaining trading sessions of this year.

A cross-sectoral review showed all group indices in the red. The NSE Banking Index depreciated by 2.3 per cent. The NSE Consumer Goods Index dropped by 2.0 per cent. The NSE Insurance Index declined by 0.5 per cent. The NSE Industrial Goods Index lost 0.3 per cent while the NSE Oil and Gas Index slipped by two basis points.

With the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), which started a two-day meeting yesterday, expected not to make any major changes to its current policy and the report at the weekend that three banks-which are likely to be quoted, inadequately capitalised, investors continued to fumbled through a wave of uncertainties on the direction of the market.

Read also: NSE LIVE! Equities lose N245b as investors await monetary decisions

“As the market continues to trend southwards in the absence of any news flow to sway investors sentiments to the positive horizon, we imagine any gains recorded in the market to be driven by bargain hunting. Hence we maintain our medium to long term view for investment decisions,” said analysts at Afrinvest Securities.

Nestle Nigeria led the 26-stock losers’ list with a loss of N10 to close at N807. Guinness Nigeria followed with a loss of N6.40 to close at N121.84. Nigerian Breweries dropped by N5 to close at N115. Ecobank Transnational Incorporated declined by 63 kobo to close at N16.50. Lafarge Africa lost 50 kobo to close at N89.50. Zenith Bank dropped by 49 kobo to N16.01. Guaranty Trust Bank lost 45 kobo to close at N21.05. CAP declined by 43 kobo to close at N38.50. UACN Property Development Company dropped by 32 kobo to close at N6.26 while Champion Breweries lost 20 kobo to close at N3.80 per share.

Total turnover stood at 154.79 million shares valued at N2.22 billion in 2,669 deals. Zenith Bank was the most active stock with a turnover of 42.36 million shares valued at N684.74 million. FBN Holdings followed with 20.47 million shares valued at N103.67 million while Diamond Bank placed third with 14.84 million shares worth N37.01 million.

On the bright side, PZ Cussons Nigeria led eight other contrarian stocks, rising by 88 kobo to close at N27.13 per share.  Seven-Up Bottling Company followed with a gain of 45 to close at N184. Portland Paints and Products Nigeria added 17 kobo to close at N4.05. Berger Paints garnered 15 kobo to close at N9.75 while E-Tranzact rose by 12 kobo to close at N2.70 per share.

 
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