Bulls succumb to pressure as profit-taking shaves N50bn off equities assets

The Nigerian equities market succumbed to pressure to record first negative daily result in June following overwhelming desires by investors to take profits earlier made on their investments.

This was notably recorded in the stocks of MTN Nigeria which slid by -1.7 per cent to dampen market performance on Thursday.

Precisely, the All-Share Index (ASI) declined by 0.38 per cent to 25,312.05 basis points  which is the biggest southward move since falling 1.1 per cent on May 12, 2020; and accordingly, Month-to-Date (MtD) return decreased to 0.2 per cent, as Year-to-Date (YtD) losses increased to -5.7 per cent.

Similarly, market capitalization of equities investments at the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) lost N50 billion in value to close at N13.204 trillion from N13.254 trillion is closed the previous session.

The downturn reflected across board as market breadth, turn over and participation were all on the low side.

Performance reduced as volume and value traded fell by 32.01 per cent and 24.73 per cent respectively at 270.193 million share units valued at N5.296 billion traded in 4,550 transactions.

Sectoral performance was negative, as -2.1 per cent losses in the banking index,-0.4 per cent decline, oil and gas and -0.3 per cent depreciation in insurance indices masked 0.9 per cent  and 0.2 per cent gains recorded in the consumer goods and industrial goods indices respectively.

Market sentiment, as measured by market breadth, was negative as 17 tickers lost, relative to 15 gainers; while 14 others traded and closed the session on unchanged prices.

Dangote Cement Plc and Dangote Sugar led gainers by adding N1.4 and N0.95 to their share prices to close at N141.90 and N15 per share accordingly.

Other gainers include Flourmill, CI Leasing and SKYVAN with daily record gains of N0.85, N0.45 and N0.22 to close at N20.85, N5.30 and N2.49 per share respectively.

On the flip side, MTN Nigeria topped decliners’ list for the day by shedding N2 to close at N116 per share. GUARANTY trailed with N0.5 loss to close at N24.50 per share while CUSTODIAN, Glaxosmith and Access Bank followed by losing N0.45, N0.40 and N0.35 to close at N5.85, N7.50 and N6.5 per share respectively.

Meanwhile, NSE data released that market activities for the day were mostly driven by transactions on banking stocks, led by FBNH that traded 41.353 million shares worth N225.671 million while Dangote Cement emerged with the highest turnover of N2.574 billion by trading 18.025 million shares.