Investors gain N43.41bn amid positive market turnover
By Kayode Tokede
Investors on the Nigerian Exchange Limited (NGX) equities market on Wednesday gained N43.41 billion to close on a bullish note, advancing the gaining streak to four consecutive trading sessions.
The positive performance was impacted by investors’ bargain hunting sentiments across all the major sectors, led by Insurance and Banking sectors.
In summary, the NGX All-Share Index (ASI) increased by 83.27 basis points, representing a gain of 0.22 per cent to close at 38,501.31 basis points on Wednesday.
Similarly, the overall market capitalisation value gained N43 billion to close at N20.070 trillion.
Sector performances were positive today with the Banking (+0.54 percent), Oil and Gas (+0.35 percent), Consumer Goods (+0.14 per cent) and Industrial (+0.10 percent) sectors all closing in the green.
The market upturn was driven by price appreciation in large and medium capitalised stocks amongst which are; Guaranty Trust Bank Holding Company, Dangote Sugar Refinery, Lafarge, Cutix and Custodian Investment.
Analysts at Afrinvest Limited said that “We expect the market to sustain its positive performance as investors position ahead of the first half (H1) of 2021 earnings result.”
Also, the market sentiment, as measured by market breadth, was positive as 22 stocks gained, relative to 13 losers. Cutix recorded the highest price gain of 10 per cent to close at N3.63, per share. John Holt followed with a gain 9.84 percent to close at 67 kobo and UACN Property Development Company rose by 9.71 per cent to close at N1.13, per share.
Tripple Gee & Company appreciated by 8.33 percent to close at 91 kobo, while Wapic Insurance gained 5.36 per cent to close at 59 kobo, per share. On the other hand, BOC Gases led the losers’ chart by 9.94 percent to close at N7.70, per share. Berger Paints Nigeria followed with a decline of 9.64 percent to close at N8.90, while Courteville Business Solutions shed 4.55 percent to close at 21 kobo, per share.
Japaul Gold and Ventures shed 3.92 percent to close at 49 kobo, while Unity Bank depreciated by 3.51 percent to close at 55 kobo, per share.
The total volume of trades increased by 2.5 percent to 296.099 million units, valued at N2.562 billion and exchanged in 4,507 deals. Transactions in the shares of FBN Holdings (FBNH) topped the activity chart with 34.838 million shares valued at N265.090 million. Access Bank followed with 28.694 million shares worth N271.735 million, while Zenith Bank traded 27.729 million shares valued at N689.155 million.
Fidelity Bank traded 24.742 million shares valued at N57.423 million, while Transnational Corporation of Nigeria (Transcorp) transacted 23.928 million shares worth N2.135 million.
According to analysts at investment One research, “The equities market closed up today due to the gains recorded in all major sectors.
“Going forward, we expect investor’s sentiments to be swayed by the search for real positive returns and developments in the interest rate space.
“We reiterate that this may be a great period to pick up some quality names with a medium to long-term investment horizon.”
Coronation Research in a report on Wednesday said, “ Last week the Model Equity Portfolio rose by 0.92% compared with a rise in the NGX Exchange All-Share Index (NGX-ASI) of 1.47percent, therefore underperforming it by 55 basis points. Year to date it has lost 4.18percent against a loss in the NGX-ASI of 5.11percent, outperforming it by 93basis points.
“We now reverse what we said last week: while it is nice to be making money (albeit notional money in the case of this portfolio) it is not nice to underperform the market by 55basis points in a single week.
“The clear culprit is our very underweight position in Nestle Nigeria. Nestle Nigeria rallied by 10 percent in a week and is six percent of the index, thus approximately 60basis points of performance which we did not enjoy.
“As advised last week, we made notional sales in BUA Cement, Presco, Okomu Oil and Dangote Cement, with the weight of the notional sales in BUA Cement.
“We took our notional cash position up by 5.7 percentage points. This concludes our notional sales of industrial stocks for the time being.
“This week we will deploy some of that notional cash. We will move to correct the underweight in Nestle Nigeria. Following our publication ‘Nigerian Banks: Resilience priced in’ (25 June) we have reassessed our notional position in banks and we will overweight these again, spending up to around 8.0 percentage points in notional cash on notional trades here over the coming two weeks. We need a conviction trade to outperform going into the second half of the year, and this is it.”
