Stock market rally progresses to 10th session with N27bn gain

The rally at the Nigerian stock market stretched to the 10th consecutive trading session on Wednesday, as investors continued bargain-hunting for value stocks, pushing market capitalization higher by N27 billion.

The market cap rose from its opening value of N11.524 trillion to close at N11.550 tr.

Nigerian Stock Exchange’s (NSE), lead market index also closed 0.23 per cent higher than its opening value showing improvement in investors’ appetite.

The All-Share Index (ASI) added 78.32points or 0.23 per cent to close at 33,514.93 points, pushing year-to-date gain to 25 per cent.

Sectoral indices showed that the overall market performance was driven largely by gains within the highly capitalised stocks in the Oil & Gas and Banking sectors.

The NSE Oil and Gas Index rose by 1.44 per cent while the NSE’s Banking Index appreciated by 1.07 per cent. However, the NSE Consumer goods index remained flat while The NSE’s industrial and insurance indices dipped by 0.47 per cent and 0.54 percent respectively.

The price movement chart ended flat with 24 gainers to 24 losers. Transcorp topped gainers by 8.76 per cent to close at N1.49 per share, PZ and Skye Bank followed with an increase of 5 per cent each to close at N22.05 and 63 kobo per share respectively, Oando was next with a growth of 4.99 per cent to close at N7.15 per share and Guinness appreciated 4.92 per cent to close at N66.10 per share.

Top on the day’s 24-loser list was MRS and Presco, with a decline of 4.99 per cent each to close at N35.44 and N61.32 each. Jaiz Bank came next on the losers’ chart with a drop of 4.76 per cent to close at 60 kobo, Livestock feeds recorded a loss of 4.40 per cent to close at 87 kobo per share, and AXA Mansard declined by 4.25 per cent to close at N2.03 per share.

Total volume traded by investors in 2,391 deals fell to 215.1 million shares in contrast to a turnover of 2.4 billion shares traded in previous session, while total value traded fell 90 per cent to N1.24b from total value of N21.6b exchanged by investors in 3,715 deals on Tuesday.

Custodian and Allied Insurance was the most active stock with a turnover of 25.2 billion shares valued at N85.9b. Zenith Bank followed with 23.1 million shares worth N507m, while UBA ranked third with 22.2 million shares worth N197.2m.

Transcorp traded 18.2million shares worth N26.7mi and NEM was the fifth most traded stock with 17.7 million shares valued at N21.3m