By Chinwendu Obienyi
Nigeria’s stock market is expected to see bullish momentum sustained in the first half (H1) of 2022.
This was the view of the President, Chartered Institute of Stockbrokers (CIS), Olatunde Amolegbe in his outlook for the stock market performance in 2022.
Amolegbe said the positive movement would be maintained in the first half of 2022 on the back of some factors which include good corporate performance in the first quarter, implementation of parts of the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA), which is expected to further raise government revenue.
He said the market would likely respond positively to the implementation of some part of the PIA.
According to him, the intense focus on infrastructure development is expected to spur both governmental and corporate capital raising, which will lead to increased market activity.
He said: “These will be hinged on stable macroeconomic policy, increased security and stable polity.
Two years of positive returns go to show that the market is reflecting its function as the barometer for the economy”.
Meanwhile the equities market reversed yesterday’s gains and traded with negative sentiments as investors sold off on Nestle (-7.8 per cent).
Specifically, the All-Share Index settled lower by 0.1 per cent to 43,859.30 points while market capitalization fell by N20.4 billion to close at N23.6 trillion. Accordingly, the Year-to-Date return moderated to +2.7 per cent.
The total volume of trades decreased by 5.4 per cent to 294.54 million units, valued at N6.77 billion, and exchanged in 4,501 deals.
Transcorp was the most traded stock by volume at 58.36 million units, while BUAFOODS was the most traded stock by value at NGN3.32 billion. On sectors, the Consumer Goods (-4.8 per cent), Insurance (-2.1 per cent) and Industrial Goods (-0.3 per cent) indices declined while the Oil & Gas (+1.0 per cent) and Banking (+0.2 per cent) indices posted gains.
Further analysis of the performance of the market yesterday, revealed that market sentiment was negative as 26 stocks depreciated while 17 others appreciated in value.
BUAFOODS (+10.0 per cent), ETERNA (+5.1 per cent), and UBN (+4.6 per cent) led the gainers while Mutual Benefits (-10 per cent), Berger (-9.9 per cent) and UPDCREIT (-8.1 per cent) led the decliners.
Reacting, analysts at Afrinvest, said, “In the next trading session, we expect that today’s bearish performance would be sustained on weakened investor sentiment”.
