The Nigerian equities market resumed for this week’s trading activities on Wednesday after the two-day holiday to mark the Christmas celebrations.
By the close of transactions, the benchmark index declined from 74,023.27 basis points to 73,768.64 basis points, shedding 254.63 basis points or 0.34%.
The Market Capitalisation declined by 0.35% or ₦140 billion to close at ₦40.367 trillion from last Friday’s ₦40,507 trillion.
Profit-taking activities in industrial heavyweight, DANGOTE CEMENT PLC (-2.19%), STANBIC IBTC HOLDINGS PLC (-6.01%) and DANGOTE SUGAR REFINERY PLC(-1.31%) undermined the gains in MTN COMMUNICATIONS PLC (+0.40%), ZENITH BANK PLC (+0.26%) and GUARANTY TRUST HOLDING COMPANY PLC (+0.50%).
Consequently, the Month-to-Date and Year-to-Date returns moderated to +3.4% and +43.9%, respectively.
Analysis of today’s market activities showed that the total volume of trades increased by 2.3% while the value of transactions declined by 21.99%.
A total of 432.91 million units of shares valued at ₦12.94 billion were exchanged in 8,901 deals where JAIZ BANK PLC was the most traded stock by volume at 35.38 million units, while GEREGU PLC was the most traded stock by value at ₦6.06 billion.
As measured by market breadth, market sentiment was positive, as 38 advancing issues outnumbered 21 declining ones.
ETERNA PLC (+10.00%), AXAMANSARD INSURANCE PLC (+9.96%) and MULTIVERSE MINING AND EXPLORATION PLC (-9.95%) recorded the most significant gains of the day, while U A C N PLC (-10.00%), DEAP CAPITAL MANAGEMENT & TRUST PLC (-7.25%) and CAVERTON OFFSHORE SUPPORT GRP PLC (-6.59%) topped the losers’ list.
Analysing by sectors, the Insurance (+3.1%), Oil & Gas (+0.2%) and Banking (+0.2%) indices advanced, while the Industrial Goods (-1.1%) and Consumer Goods (-0.2%) indices declined.
