Equities market records 7th consecutive negative session as Index down 0.84% Thursday

The Nigerian equities market closed negative for the seventh consecutive session, as negative sentiments continued to drive sell pressure in notable counters even as the benchmark index dropped 0.84 per cent to 32,022.23 points on Thursday.

Accordingly, the Month-to-Date and Year-to-Date losses rose to 8.11 per cent and 16.27 per cent respectively.

The Industrial Goods (-3.34%) index remained the top loser, owing to sell pressure in WAPCO (-10.00%) and CCNN (-9.87%) shares. The Consumer Goods (-2.31%), Insurance (-1.55%), and Oil & Gas (-0.72%) indices also closed negative, following losses posted in the respective shares of HONYFLOUR (-8.63%), WAPIC (-7.50%), and FO (-7.41%).

On the flip side, gains in GUARANTY (+1.07%) shares led to the marginal uptick in the Banking (+0.01%) index.

Market breadth remained negative with 26 losers and 9 gainers, led by WAPCO (-10.00%) and SKYEBANK (+9.84%) shares, respectively. Total volume and value of trades dropped by 29.71% and 46.44% to 173.55 million units and NGN3.71 billion respectively, exchanged in 3,082 deals.

“The absence of a one-off positive trigger and political jitters ahead of the 2019 elections, guide our conservative outlook for equities in the short to medium term. However, stable macroeconomic fundamentals remain supportive of recovery in the long term”. Analysts at Cordros Capital said.

The USD/NGN depreciated by 0.28 per cent on the day  to NGN361 in the parallel market, while it strengthened by 0.09 per cent to NGN362.78 in the I&E FX window. Total turnover in the IEW was higher by 54.83 per cent to USD341.56 million, consummated within the NGN330.00-NGN364.75/USD band.