Yesterday, the domestic equities market extended its losses to the second trading session of the week on the back of sustained losses in NIGERIAN BREWERIES (-9.7%), NESTLE (-3.5%) and UNILEVER (-8.5%).
As a result, the Benchmark Index shed 1.0% to 30,226.7 points while YTD loss further dipped to -3.8% and N169bn was wiped off investors’ wealth as market capitalisation fell to N11.4tn. Furthermore, activity level was mixed as value traded advanced by 23.3% to N4.5bn while volume traded declined by 78.2% to 376.5m units.
The top traded stocks by value were NESTLE (N905.2m), NIGERIAN BREWERIES (N776.5m) and GUARANTY (N720.8m) while the top traded stocks by volume were FCMB (53.9m units), STERLING (41.4m units) and UBA (41.3m units).
Mixed Sector Performance
Performance across sectors was mixed, albeit negatively skewed as only 2 out of 5 sectors under our coverage advanced.
The Insurance index advanced the most by 0.9% as investors took position in NEM (+5.0%) and CUSTODIAN (+0.82%) while the Industrial index advanced marginally by 0.1% as gains in DANGCEM (+1.1%) offset sustained losses in BETAGLASS (+10.0%).
On the flip side, the Consumer Goods index further declined by 3.8% following sustained profit taking activities in NIGERIAN BREWERIES (-9.7%), NESTLE (-3.5%) and UNILEVER (-8.5%).
Likewise, the Oil and Gas index and the Banking index shed 1.8% and 1.1% respectively due to sustained losses in OANDO (-7.8%), FORTE (-9.9%), UBA (-2.6%) and ETI (-2.0%).
Investor Sentiment Remains Soft
Investors sentiment as measured by market breadth (advance/decline ratio) weakened to 0.4x from 0.8x recorded in yesterday’s session as 10 stocks advanced against 28 stocks that declined.
The top performing stocks were WEMA (+10.0%), SOVERININ (+10.0%) and IKEJHOTEL (+9.7%) while the most underperforming stocks were BETAGLASS (-10.0%), FORTE (-9.9%) and NIGERIAN BREWERIES (-9.7%).
While we expect this negative performance recorded thus far to persist in subsequent trading sessions, we do not rule out the possibility of an upturn in the performance of the Benchmark index as investors continue to take position in fundamentally attractive stocks.
