Equities market dips by 0.5% as investors lose N162.2bn

Kehinde Akinseinde-Jayeoba, Lagos

On Wednesday, the domestic bourse ended its five-day winning streak as the benchmark index shed 0.53 per cent to close at 55,508.61 points. 

Notably, selloffs in telco heavyweight, Airtel Africa, as well as Lafarge Africa, underpinned the market’s weak performance as the share prices of these large cap companies dipped by 5.25 per cent and 1.46 per cent, respectively. 

Accordingly, the Month-to-Date and Year-to-Date returns printed -0.5 per cent and +8.3 per cent, respectively.

Due to the bearish sentiments, equities investors lose N162.15 billion as the market capitalisation settled at N30.24 trillion at the end of trading activities on Wednesday.

As measured by market breadth, market sentiment was positive as 29 tickers gained relative to 12 losers. On the performance board, Veritas Capital and Ardova topped the gainers’ list, having appreciated in shares values by 10.0 per cent and 9.8 per cent, respectively; while John Holt and Ecobank Transnational Incorporated recorded the most significant losses of the day as their share prices dipped by 9.7 per cent and 7.7 per cent, respectively.

Despite the overall lull, sectorial performance was positive as three of the five indices tracked closed in the green zone. The NGX Insurance, NGX Consumer Goods, and NGX Oil/Gas indices rose by 1.23 per cent, 2.48 per cent, and 0.77 per cent, respectively. 

Conversely, the NGX Banking and NGX Industrial indexes dwindled by 0.04 per cent and 0.08 per cent, respectively. 

In the broader market, the NGX Premium rose by 3 basis points while the NGX-30 index decreased by 60 basis points. 

Analysis of market activities showed trade turnover settled higher relative to the previous session, with the value of transactions up by 49.77 per cent. 

A total of 565.82 million shares valued at N6.58 billion were exchanged in 4,340 deals. Tramsnational Corporation led the volume chart with 47.89 million units traded while Guaranty Trust Holding Company led the value chart in deals worth N1.26 billion.