STOCK MARKET: Investors lose N78.7 as sell pressure hits Market

Investors in the banking stocks on Wednesday lost a total of N78.7 billion to sell pressure in value.

Market capitalisation also fell to N11.6 trillion in the banking stocks including Guaranty (-3.7%), Stanbic (-5.2%) and FBNH(-2.4%)

The benchmark index was dragged 67 basis points (bps) lower to settle at 30,829.45 points, as the year to date (YTD) return worsened to -1.9%.

Consequently, activity level declined as volume and value traded dipped 8.5% and 16.6% to 131.4m units and N1.4bn respectively.

The top traded stocks by volume were Zenith (27.9m units), Sterling (25.0m units) and Access (16.2m units) while Zenith (N606.6m), Nigerian Breweries (N151.3m) and Access (N104.1m) led the top trades by value.

The Industrial Goods index emerged the lone gainer, up 3bps due to buying interest in Cutix (+9.7%).

Read also: FG, states, LGs share N619.8bn for February

Meanwhile, the Insurance index shed the most, down 1.3% on the back of sell pressures in Custodian (-3.2%), NEM (-5.5%) and WAPIC (-2.5%), trailed by the Banking index which declined 1.0% as Guaranty (-3.7%), Stanbic (-5.2%) and Access (-0.8%) closed in the red.

The Oil and Gas index was dragged down by 0.8& due to sell offs in SEPLAT (-1.8%) while the Consumer Goods index declined 0.4% as a result of losses in Guinness (-2.4%), Flourmill (-5.0%) and DANGFLOUR (-3.9%).

Investor sentiment as measured by market breadth weakened to 0.6x from 0.9x recorded the previous day as 11 stocks advanced relative to 19 stocks that declined.

Top outperforming stocks were UNIONDAC (+10.0%), Cutix (+9.7%) and MEDVIEWAIR (+5.9%) while NEM (-5.5%), Stanbic (-5.2%) and Flourmill (-5.0%) led laggards.

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