Stock Market Halts Losses as Inflation Worries Slowdown
The Nigerian stock market halts losses on Tuesday as inflation worries slow down after the National Bureau of Statistics reported a 37 basis points decline for the month of July 2021.
After opening on negative on Monday, bullish sentiments return with market performance indicators, the Nigerian Exchange All-share index and market Capitalization both gaining by 0.11 per cent and 0.12 per cent respectively.
Year to date losses moderated to -1.8% while month to date returns expanded to 2.6% amidst renewed rally in Dangote Cement stock. After adding N23.4 billion gain, the stock market capitalisation closed N20.606 trillion, bond capitalisation N18.023 trillion and exchange-traded fund (ETF) N12.597 billion.
According to Atlass Portfolios, positive sentiments were printed on the market by price appreciation in tickers such as DANGCEM, HONEYFLOUR, TRANSCORP STERLNBANK, FIDELITYBK, FBNH, LIVESTOCK, WEMABANK, and PHARMDEKO.
However, market breadth turned neutral with 16 gainers versus 16 losers while activities closed on a lower note. Market data shows that the total volume and value of stocks traded on the exchange declining by 21.64 per cent and 9.12 per cent respectively.
A total of 110.70 million units of shares valued at N3.08 billion were traded in 3,305 deals. TRANSCORP led the volume chart, accounting for 10.78 per cent of the total volume of trades.
This was followed by FBNH (9.99%), OANDO (6.60%), ACCESS (5.59%), and NAHCO (4.87%) to complete the top five on the volume chart.
NESTLE topped the value chart accounting for 70.51 per cent of the total value of trade on the exchange.
HONEYFLOUR, PHARMDEKO, and WEMABANK topped the gainers’ chart, with their share prices inching upward by 9.78 per cent, 9.24 per cent, and 3.70 per cent, respectively. Meanwhile, SCOA led the losers’ table with its share price declining by 9.74 per cent to close at N1.76 after opening the day at N1.95.
In its market report, Afrinvest said performance across sector under its coverage was bearish as 4 indices lost, 1 index gained while the AFR-ICT index remained flat.
Topping the laggards are the Consumer Goods and Insurance indices, down 4.6% and 1.2% respectively on the back of profit-taking in NESTLE (-9.1%), UNILEVER (-3.5%), LINKASSURE (-6.4%), and MANSARD (-2.2%).
Similarly, the Oil & Gas and Banking indices fell by 0.2% and 2bps respectively due to sell-offs in OANDO (-0.8%), ZENITH (-0.2%), and GTCO (-0.2%). Conversely, the Industrial Goods index was the lone gainer, up 1.8% driven by price appreciation in DANGCEM (+3.3%).
“Given the latest moderation in inflation numbers, we expect buy sentiment to dominate tomorrow’s trading as investors reprice risk on equity assets”, analysts said.
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Stock Market Halts Losses as Inflation Worries Slowdown
