Chinwendu Obienyi
After slipping down by 2.1 per week-on-week (W-o-W) last week, transaction proceedings on the floor of the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) yesterday kick-started the week on a positive note as the All Share Index (ASI) rose by 0.95 per cent to close at 32,129.94 on account of gains in the shares of GT Bank, International Breweries and Zenith Bank.
This is even as market capitalisation increased by N113 billion to close at N11.981 trillion from N11.868 trillion recorded on Friday while Year-to-Date (YtD) performance improved to 2.2 per cent.
Reacting, Chief Executive Officer, Crane Securities, Mike Eze, reckons that the gains seen in yesterday’s session would be in bits adding that investors are already taking positions gradually.
Also Analysts at Afrinvest, said, “We believe that the positive performance recorded today will persist into subsequent trading sessions as investors continue to take positions in fundamentally sound stocks”.
However, activity level weakened as volume and value traded dipped 33 and 30.3 per cent to 228.48 million units and N2.61 billion respectively, exchanged in 3,544 deals.
Market breadth turned positive as 25 stocks appreciated in value while 10 others depreciated. MCNICHOLS topped the gainers’ chart with 9.80 per cent to close at 0.56 kobo per share, Cutix followed with 9.76 per cent to close at N2.25, NPF Microfinance Bank garnered 9.72 per cent to close at N1.58, Wema Bank notched up 9.09 per cent to close at 0.84 kobo while Sovereign Insurance increased by 8.70 per cent to close at 0.25 kobo.
On the flipside, PZ led the laggards with a 9.67 per cent loss to close at N12.15 per share. Livestock feeds was next with 8.96 per cent to close at 0.61 kobo, Chip Plc fell by 7.14 per cent to close at 0.26 kobo, Law Union decreased by 5.45 per cent to close at 0.52 kobo while UCAP lost 2.99 per cent to close at N3.25.