Nigerian Stocks Plunge, Investors Lose N104bn as Banking Names Dip
Nigerian stocks selloffs extended with investors losing about N104 billion on Thursday due to profit taking activities across sectoral indexes.
The market experienced sustained sell pressure in heavyweights such as Zenith Bank, GTCO, UBA and a number of other counters contributed to the negative market sentiment.
Hence, the Nigerian Exchange (NGX) All-share index (ASI) dropped by seven basis points or 0.07%, dragging the market year to date return to 57.41% on Thursday.
The equities market capitalisation edged lower by N103.59 billion to close at N159.05 trillion. Investor sentiment remained bearish, as 22 stocks recorded losses compared with 16 gainers, resulting in a market breadth of 0.73x.
Ticker: AVACAP, PZ, TANTALIZER, INTENEGINS, and VFDGROUP emerged as the top gainers, while THOMASWY, AUSTINLAZ, NSLTECH, UPDC, and CORNEST recorded the largest declines.
Trading activity was mixed, as the number of deals and transaction value declined by 3.63% and 13.91%, respectively, while trading volume increased by 1.87%. Overall, 31,401 deals involving 360.75 million shares valued at ₦20.32 billion were recorded during the session.
Sectoral performance was largely negative, with the Banking, Insurance, Consumer Goods, and Oil/Gas indices declining by 0.16%, 0.54%, 0.30%, and 0.11%, respectively.
Conversely, the Industrial Goods index advanced by 0.10%, while the Commodity index remained unchanged. Stockbrokers said they expect the market to remain sensitive to investor sentiment and profit taking activities in the near term.
However, bargain-hunting in fundamentally strong stocks could provide some support for market performance, although sustained selling pressure may limit potential gains, according to Cowry Asset Securities Limited.
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