Nigerian stocks trade flat at week opening as index barely advanced 0.02%

The Nigerian equities market traded flat Monday as benchmark index, the NSEASI, advanced barely two basis points to settle at 42,579.48 points, just as year-to-date (YTD) return closed flat at 11.3 percent.

However, market capitalization increased by N3.1 billion to N15.3 trillion.

The day’s market performance was largely driven by price appreciation in INTBREW (+5.0%), GUARANTY (+1.5%) and ZENITH (+0.8%), which offset losses in DANGCEM (-0.4%), UBA (-3.5%) and SEPLAT (-2.0%).

Activity level was mixed as volume traded appreciated 24.8 percent to 384.9 million units on the back of trades in CCNN (134.8m), TRANSCORP (33.9m) and FIDELITY (16.3m). However, value traded declined 14.5 percent to N5.5 billion with CCNN (N2.3bn), DANGCEM (N0.55bn) and NIGERIAN BREWERIES (N0.35bn) leading as top traded stocks by value.

Sector performance was mixed as three indices advanced while two declined.

The consumer goods index led gainers, up 0.8 percent following a rally in INTBREW (+5.0%) and PZ (+5.0%). In the same vein, the insurance and banking indices appreciated 0.5 percent and 0.3 percent respectively as investors took positions in WAPIC (+2.9%), AIICO (+2.7%), GUARANTY (+1.5) and ZENITH (+0.8%).

On the flipside, the oil & gas index shed 2.5 percent primarily due to losses in SEPLAT (-2.0%) and TOTAL (-4.8%) just as sell-offs in DANGCEM (-0.4%) pulled the industrial goods index 0.2 percent lower.

Market breadth (advance/decline ratio), which measures investor sentiment improved but stayed negative at 0.8x as 21 stocks advanced against 26 stocks that declined.

The top gainers on the day were JAPAUL OIL (+9.5), UNITY (+9.4%) and NASCON (+5.1%) whereas COURTVILLE (-6.3%), CAVERTON (-5.0%) and MOBIL (-5.0%) led laggards

The development, according to analysts, indicates sentiment is improving though week

“This shows sentiment is improving although still weak. In the near term, we expect market performance to be largely driven by full year 2017 result expectations,” analysts at Afrinvest noted.