At the end of today’s trading session, the Nigerian equities market closed in red as the benchmark index declined by 0.03% to close at 42,230.48 points.
This was mainly due to sell pressures in bellwether stocks such as MTNN (-0.44%) and ZENITHBANK (-0.82%). Consequently, the YTD return further decreased to 4.87% as market capitalisation declined by ₦7.18 billion to close at ₦22.04 trillion.
The sectoral performance significantly strengthened as four of the five indices under coverage improved while the Consumer Goods index, the only loser, declined by 0.02% on HONYFLOUR (-1.43%). The Oil & Gas index, the biggest gainer, improved by 1.10% on OANDO (+5.26%). The Banking, Insurance and Industrial indices followed suit, increasing by 0.52%, 0.36% and 0.13% on UBN (+9.78%), MBENEFIT (+6.67%) and WAPCO (+0.43%) respectively.
Investor sentiment strengthened as the market breadth increased to 1.27x from 1.14x. This was illustrated by the advance of 14 stocks, led by UBN (+9.78%) and ROYALEX (+7.14%) and the decline of 11 stocks, led by JBERGER (-9.88%) and UPDC (-5.60%). Activity level weakened as the total volume and value decreased by 5.77% and 7.26% respectively as investors exchanged about 211.09 million units of shares worth over ₦2.46billion.
We expect positive sentiment to return in the next trading session as the equities market still presents decent opportunities for investors chasing positive real returns on investments.
Fixed Income
There was mixed sentiment across the bond yield curve as 2 of the 4 bond yields under coverage closed flat while each of the yields on the FGN-APR-2023 and FGN-APR-2024 compressed by 1bp. The yields on FGN-JAN-2026 and FGN-JUL-2030 closed flat at 11.28% and 12.60 respectively.
Treasury bill yields for the 91 and 364 day-papers closed flat at 3.27% and 5.24% respectively while the 182-day paper compressed by 39bps to close at 3.67%.
We expect a further decline in yields in the next trading session on the back of huge demand from investors and the deliberate efforts of the DMO to reduce borrowing costs.
MARKET SNAPSHOT
- Negative Performance Persists in the Local Bourse, NGX ASI Sheds 3bps
- Mixed Sentiment across the Bond Yield Curve
- Positive Sentiment in Global Stocks
- Positive Performance in the Commodities Market
- Positive Performance in African Stocks
