Market Return Moderated as Investors Offload Stocks
Stock market return moderated below 30% on Thursday as equities investors continue to offloading their portfolios.
In the penultimate trading session for the week, the local equities market declined, extending yesterday’s loss as ZENITH (-6.2%), WAPCO (-10.0%) and FBNH (-10.0%) closed in the red.
Accordingly, the All Share Index fell 127 basis points (bps) to settle at 34,577.26 points.
Hence, market capitalisation declined by ₦232.1 billion to ₦18.1 trillion while year to date return moderated to 28.8%.
Activity level strengthened as volume and value traded rose 95.7% and 94.1% to 553.9m units and ₦6.6bn respectively.
The most traded stocks by volume were GUARANTY (87.0m units), ZENITH (65.0m units) and TRANSCORP (52.5m units).
Meanwhile GUARANTY (₦2.8bn), ZENITH (₦1.5bn) and MTNN (₦405.0m) led by value.
Afrinvest said performance across sectors was bearish as all indices under its coverage closed southward.
The Banking and Insurance indices lost, down 4.1% and 3.7% respectively on account of sell-offs in ZENITH (-6.2%), FBNH (-10.0%), MANSARD (-6.1%) and AIICO (-5.4%).
Similarly, the Consumer and Industrial Goods indices trailed, shedding 1.1% and 0.7% respectively following losses in DANGSUGAR (-6.9%), GUINNESS (-9.8%), WAPCO (-10.0%) and CUTIX (-6.8%).
Additionally, sell pressures in OANDO (-6.4%), ARDOVA (-1.1%) and MTNN (-0.8%) dragged the Oil & Gas and AFR-ICT indices down by 0.7% and 0.4% respectively.
Investor sentiment as measured by market breadth declined to 0.2x from the 0.6x recorded in the previous session as 6 stocks gained against the 40 that declined.
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OKOMUOIL (+10.0%), MBENEFIT (+9.1%) and FTNCOCOA (+8.1%) led the gainers while WAPCO (-10.0%), FBNH (-10.0%) and UPL (-10.0%) led the decliners.
Moving forward, analysts at Afrinvest said they expect the market to close the week in the red as investor sentiment remains weak.
