NGX: Losses in GTCO, Lafarge, Access Holdings further dips equities market by 0.1 percent

Kehinde Akinseinde-Jayeoba, Lagos

On Tuesday, equities trading at the Nigerian Exchange Limited followed previous day’s trend to close bearish.

Thus, the All-Share Index declined by 0.1 per cent to 55,722.90 basis points as against a previous close of 55,788.37 basis points.

Sell pressures in Guaranty Trust Holding Company, Lafarge Africa and Access Corporation were the primary drivers of the drag on the overall market’s performance as the large capitalised stocks depreciated by 3.08 per cent, 1.92 per cent and 0.55 per cent, respectively.

Consequently, the Month-to-Date and Year-to-Date returns settled at -0.2 per cent and +8.7 per cent, respectively.
Equities investors, therefore, lost N35.67 billion as the market capitalisation settled lower at N30.36 trillion at the end of trading sessions on Tuesday.

As measured by market breadth, market sentiment was negative as 17 stocks lost relative to nine gainers. On the performance board, Chams and Prestige Insurance topped the losers’ list as their share prices dipped by 8.0 per cent and 7.3 per cent, respectively; while Enamel Wares and FTN Cocoa Processors recorded the highest gains of the day after their share prices increased by 9.6 per cent and 7.7 per cent, respectively.

Performance across sub-indices tracked was negative, except for the NGX Consumer Goods index, which rose marginally by 0.01 per cent, while the NGX Oil/Gas Index stayed flat. The NGX Banking, NGX Insurance, and NGX Industrial indices fell by 0.24 per cent, 1.91 per cent and 0.10 per cent, respectively. In the broader market, the NGX Premium and the NGX-30 index decreased by 6 basis points and 13 basis points, respectively.

Analysis of market activities showed trade turnover settled higher relative to the previous session, with the value of transactions up by 10.47 per cent. A total of 199.27 million shares valued at N2.81 billion were exchanged in 3,898 deals. Sterling Bank led the volume chart with 31.09 million units traded in deals while Airtel Africa led the value chart with N678.00 million.