By Christy Animam
The local bourse sustained its weekly bull dominance ahead of the festive holidays just as the Nigerian Exchange Limited (NGX) witnessed the persistence of bargain hunting activities among investors and traders who are looking to take position in value stocks at their current prices.
Regardless of the profit-taking activities by speculators, the bourse’s bull trend stays strong and is expected to be sustained the recovery mode heading into another trading year.
At the close of the week, the benchmark index trended northward by 0.79% week on week to settle at 49,706.09 basis points in the face of strong momentum and buying sentiment from players ahead of the year-end window dressing by traders and investors who want to close the year higher than was earned at the end of the year.
This was coupled with the changing yield environment in the fixed income space as was seen from the recent Nigerian Treasury Bills Primary Market where the rates and yield suffered decline across tenor gauges.
Similarly, the capitalization of listed equities rose 0.79% week on week to N27.07 trillion for the first time since August 10, 2022 as investors booked profit worth N212.3 billion in 5 days while the market year to date return inched further to 16.36%.
Consequently, the bull dominance buoyed by positive sentiment from equity investors prompted gains from price appreciation in tickers such as CHAMPION (+15%), ARDOVA (+13%), JBERGER (+10%), FIDELITYBK (+9%) and STANBIC (+9%).
Across the sectorial front, the performance was largely bullish in the week with all major sectors closing northward and was spearheaded by the Banking Index which gained 1.97% week on week.
Similarly, the Consumer Goods sector performed positively by 0.98%, and was followed by NGX Oil & Gas, NGX Insurance and NGX Industrial Goods Indices which closed the week by +0.91%, +0.32% and +0.04% in that order from the prior week.
Meanwhile, the level of trading activities in the week came in strong as the total traded volume and value reversed last week’s declines by 5.75% and 1.02% week on week to 860.93 million units valued at N16.134 billion.
The Financial Services Industry (measured by volume) led the activity chart with 360.234 million shares valued at N3.772 billion traded in 6,905 deals; thus contributing 41.84% and 23.38% to the total equity turnover volume and value respectively.
The Construction/Real Estate Industry followed with 302.200 million shares worth N927.033 million in 261 deals while the third place was the Consumer Goods Industry, with a turnover of 39.078 million shares worth N1.685 billion in 2,593 deals.
Trading in the top three equities namely UPDC Real Estate Investment Trust, FBN Holdings Plc and Guaranty Trust Holding Company Plc (measured by volume) accounted for 440.239 million shares worth N3.015 billion in 2,038 deals, contributing 51.13% and 18.69% to the total equity turnover volume and value respectively.
In the fixed income segment of the Nigerian Exchange Limited (NGX), investors traded a total of 28,007 units of bond valued at N27.186 million were traded during the week in 15 deals compared with a total of 10,398 units valued at N11.496 million transacted in 14 deals the previous week.
Analysts at Cowry Assets envisaged that the current trend is expected to continue on profit-taking and bargain hunting activities ahead of the holidays as the market pullbacks add more strength to the upside potential of the index.
