Nigerian Exchange Declines by N365bn over Weak Investors’ Sentiment
Equities investors lost more little more than N365 billion on Nigerian Exchange, NGX, due to sell pressures seen across indexes. This marked the third consecutive week of negative performance, reaching a four-week low as bearish sentiment triggered sell pressure.
The market witnessed sell pressures on MTN Nigeria which lost -4.22% of its market value. Investors priced down OANDO by -7.14% and UBA lost -3.56% of its market value.
There was a touch on sell pressure on key stocks as weak sentiment persisted, causing prices to fluctuate significantly amidst earnings release. Investors weighed development in financial markets to form buy, sell or hold opinions ahead of release February inflation data set.
Hence, the Nigerian Exchange all-share index declined by 0.55% week-on-week to 105,955.13 points. This reflects portfolio rebalancing as market anticipates further corporate earnings reports.
Similarly, market capitalisation fell by 0.55% or N365.4 billion to N66.35 trillion due to below-average trading volumes and a negative market breadth.
Trading details revealed that the year-to-date return has moderated to 2.94%. Despite lacklustre market internals, trading activity remained buoyant. The market breadth remained negative at 0.80x, with 37 gainers against 46 losers.
However, weekly trading volume surged by 80.45% week-on-week to 3.28 billion units, as investors focused on penny stocks with strong fundamentals in search of alpha, Cowry Asset Limited told investors.
The weekly traded value increased by 34.49% to N63.52 billion from N47.23 billion in the previous week. In contrast, the total number of deals fell by 5.36% week-on-week to 60,782 trades.
Sectoral performance was mixed, with three sectors closing in positive territory while the remaining three recorded losses. The Insurance sector led the gainers, rising by 0.89% week-on-week due to price appreciations in ROYALEX, CORNERST, and LINKASSURE.
It was followed by marginal gains in the Consumer Goods and Commodity indices, which increased by 0.03% and 0.02%, respectively, driven by gains in LIVESTOCK, FTNCOCOA, INTBREW, and OKOMUOIL.
Conversely, the Oil & Gas index led the laggards, declining by 1.15% week-on-week due to sell-offs in CONOIL, OANDO, and TOTAL.
The Banking and NGX-Industrial indices also posted losses of 0.45% and 0.21%, respectively, as investors reduced their holdings in BERGERPAINTS, JAIZBANK, RTBRISCOE, UBA, and FIRSTHOLDCO.
Among the best-performing stocks of the week, LIVESTOCK FEEDS, CAVERTON, FTN COCOA, CWG, and TANTALIZER led the pack with respective gains of 22.2%, 15.4%, 14.2%, 13.2%, and 13.1%.
On the flip side, NEIMETH, MECURE, INTENEGINS, CONOIL, and UPL emerged as the worst-performing stocks, shedding 17.0%, 10.4%, 10.3%, and 10.0% each.
“… We note that the continued challenges faced by the local equities market week-on-week as global market trends exert pressure in a mixed fashion.
“The imposition of tariffs by former United States President Donald Trump on imports from China, Mexico, Canada, and the European Union contributed to volatile investor sentiment.
“Looking ahead, we anticipate continued mixed sentiment as the market undergoes corrections, placing the exchange in an overbought region”, Cowry Asset Limited said.
Stockbrokers said profit-taking, portfolio reshuffling, and bargain hunting are likely to persist as investors digest corporate actions and Q1 earnings forecasts.
Additionally, the release of the Consumer Price Index (CPI) report for February 2025 will be a key driver of market direction, as investors assess its implications for their portfolios. #Nigerian Exchange Declines by N365bn over Weak Investors’ Sentiment#
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