The Nigerian equities market commenced this week’s trading activities bearish as the benchmark index shed off 1.49%.
Precisely, the market capitalisation declined from ₦28,268 to settle at ₦27,850 by ₦418 or 1.49% while the All-Share Index fell from 51,893.94 basis points to 51,127.38 basis points losing 766.56 basis points or 1.49%.
Today’s bearish close was attributed to losses in telco heavyweight MTN NIGERIA COMMUNICATIONS PLC (-6.7%) as well as selloffs in ZENITH BANK PLC (-0.5%) and FBN HOLDINGS PLC(-1.44%).
These losses offset the gains in GUARANTY TRUST HOLDING COMPANY PLC(+2.46%), ACCESS HOLDINGS PLC(+0.56%) and UNITED BANK FOR AFRICA PLC(+3.95%).
Analysis of today’s market activities showed that a total of 226.59 million units of shares valued at ₦1.57bn were exchanged in 4,373 deals.
TRANSNATIONAL CORPORATION PLC (+9.47%) led the volume chart with 63.44m units traded, while ZENITH BANK PLC (-0.45%) led the value chart in deals worth ₦292.63m.
As measured by market breadth, market sentiment was negative with 18 declining issues outnumbering the 16 advancing ones.
Top on the declininers table is INTERNATIONAL ENERGY INSURANCE PLC falling from ₦1.29k per share to ₦1.20k per share, shedding 0.09k or 6.98%.
Followed by MTN NIGERIA COMMUNICATIONS PLC falling from ₦240.00 per share to ₦224.00 per share, losing ₦16.00 or 6.67%.
And TRANSCORP HOTELS PLC declined from ₦6.90k per share to ₦6.50k per share by 0.40k or 5.80%.
On the advancers chart however, IKEJA HOTEL PLC gained 0.11k or 9.48% to settle at ₦1.27k per share up from Friday’s ₦1.16k per share.
TRANSNATIONAL CORPORATION PLC followed with a gain on Friday’s ₦1.69k per share by 0.16k or 9.47% to ₦1.85k per share.
While CONSOLIDATED HALLMARK INSURANCE PLC upped from 0.57k per share to 0.62k per share by 0.05k or 8.77%
On sectoral performance, the Banking (-5.5%) and Insurance (-0.1%) indices declined, while the Oil & Gas and Industrial Goods indices closed flat. The Consumer Goods (+0.1%) index was the sole gainer of the day.
