Market Statistics: Thursday, 7th February 2019

Domestic Bourse Sustains Bullish Streak… ASI up 2.0%
In yesterday’s trading session, bargain hunting in bellwethers sustained the positive performance on the local bourse as the NSE All Share Index (ASI) improved 2.0% on the back of gains in GUARANTY (+9.5%), ZENITH (+7.2%) and DANGCEM (+1.2%).

Consequently, market capitalization improved to N11.7tn as investors’ wealth increased by N228.1bn and Ytd returns turned positive. Activity level also improved as volume and value traded both increased 21.8% a apiece 436.7m units and N5.9bn respectively.

Banking stocks led both the top traded stocks by volume and value as UBA (136.8m), ZENITH (63.4m) and ACCESS (44.4m) were the top traded stocks by volume, while ZENITH(N1.5bn), GUARANTY (N1.2bn) and UBA (N987.1m) were the top traded stocks by value.

Banking Sector Leads Positive Performance
All sectors under our coverage closed in the green led by the Banking index up 5.8% due to gains in bellwethers – GUARANTY (+9.5%) and ZENITH (7.2%).

The Consumer Goods and Industrial Goods indices followed, rising 3.4% and 1.5% respectively as prices of NESTLE (+0.7%),DANGSUGAR (+6.3%), DANGCEM (+1.2%) and WAPCO (+2.5%) appreciated. Furthermore, the Oil & Gas index reversed its bearish performance, up 0.8% – as FORTE (+10.0%) and OANDO (+1.0%) advanced. Lastly, the Insurance index improved by 0.5% driven by AIICO (+7.1%).

Significant Improvement in Investor Sentiment 
Investor sentiment as measured by market breadth (advance/decline ratio) improved to 1.9x from 1.1x recorded yesterday as 25 stocks appreciated while 12 stocks declined. FORTE (+10.0%), UNITY (+9.8%) and GUARANTY (+9.5%) were the top performers while the worst performing stocks were TRANSEXPR (-8.7%), ROYALEX (-7.1%) and LEARNAFRCA (-6.7%).

The strengthening sentiment in the market shows buying appetite of investors which we expect to persist in the near term. Investors are thus advised to cautiously take advantage of bargains in fundamentally sound stocks.