Stocks Tumble in Volatile Trade as Investors Nurse N157Bn Loss
The Nigerian stock market tumble in volatile trade as Nigerian equities investors nurse a N156.7 billion loss this week ahead of Easter celebration. The sell-offs persisted as conservative investors, especially, the Pension Fund Administrators go after improve yields in the fixed income segment.
In what appears like coordinated pressures, investors dumped stocks for three out of four trading sessions this week, resulting to depreciation of combine stocks value.
Consequently, the NSE All-Share Index fell 0.7% this week below record level achieved previous week to settle at 38,916.7 points.
Then, amidst the subtle market rout, year to date loss worsened to -3.4% while market capitalisation declined ₦156.7 billion to settle at ₦20.4 trillion.
However, activity level advanced as average volume and value traded rose 18.1% and 11.7% to 361.2 million units and ₦4.8 billion, Afrinvest said in a report.
The top traded stocks by volume were GUARANTY (279.7 million units), UBN (237.2 million units) and WEMABANK (153.5 million units). Meanwhile GUARANTY (₦8.9 billion), ZENITH (₦1.5 billion) and UBN (₦1.3 billion) led by value.
Afrinvest stated that performance was mixed across sectors under its coverage. The Insurance index led gainers with 2.8% in the week following gains in LINKASSURE (+41.2%) and MBENEFIT (+17.9%).
Similarly, the Consumer Goods and AFI-ICT indices rose 1.9% and 0.1% week on week respectively due to buying interest in GUINNESS (+31.5%), CHAMPION (+6.1%), and MTNN.
On the flip side, the Industrial Goods index led laggards, down 2.1% in the week on the back of sell-offs in DANGCEM (-4.4%).
In addition, the Banking and Oil & Gas indices declined 1.3% and 0.3% respectively due to profit-taking in UNITYBNK (-6.7%), FCMB (-5.0%), and OANDO (-4.8%).
Analysts said investor sentiment as measured by market breadth worsened to 2.0x from the 2.5x recorded last week as 40 stocks advanced against 20 stocks that declined.
The top performing stocks for the week were LINKASSURE (+41.2%), GUINNESS (+31.5%) and ROYALEX (+26.9%). FTNCOCOA (-17.6%), DAARCOMM (-16.0%) and REGALINS (-12.1%) were the laggards.
“With the continued recovery of yields in the fixed income market, we anticipate a soft equities market in the coming week”, Afrinvest said.
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Stocks Tumble in Volatile Trade as Investors Nurse N157bn Loss
