Nigerian Equity Markets | 09 Oct 2015: Nigerian Equity Ends Green After 5 days in Red… Market Cap N14 Billion higher …

Lagos, Nigeria, Capital Markets in Africa — The Nigerian Bourse ended the week in green after 5 days of consecutive losses as the All Share Index (ASI) inched 14bps higher to close at 30,165.22 points. Similarly, market capitalization expanded N14.4bn to close at N10.4tn. Today’s positive close was on the back of appreciations in Banking bellwethers – GUARANTY (+1.4%), ZENITH (+1.6%) and FBNH (+1.6%). However, market activities decreased — volume and value were down 14.4% and 30.3% to 188.0m and N1.3bn respectively.

Sector indices within our coverage indicated a mix performance. The Banking index led sector gainers with 0.9%, majorly attributable to improved buying interest in GUARANTY (+1.4%) and ZENITH (+1.6%).  Equally, the Insurance index swung positive to 0.7% after declining on the previous 4 trading days; consequent on gains in MANSARD (+1.7%) and AIICO (+4.7%). The Oil & Gas index also closed 0.5% higher. Conversely, the Consumer Goods index shed 0.3% against decreases recorded in NIGERIAN BREWERIES (-0.7%) and GUINNESS (-0.6%) during trade today. The Industrial Goods index followed with a marginal decline of 4bps.

Market breadth — ratio of advancers to decliners — turned positive at 1.6x as 22 stocks advanced against 14 declining stocks. On the gainers chart, UNITY BANK (+8.0%) AIICO (+4.7%) and NEM (+4.5%) led gains while FCMB (-7.1%), CCNN (-4.9%) and EVANSMED (-4.8%) led losses. We believe today’s positive close was consequent on activities of bargain hunters who took advantage of cheap valuations that arose from the previous days of losses. Nonetheless, we expect market performance in the near term to be driven by 3^rd quarter earnings releases. 

Source: Afrinvest (West Africa) Limited Research Team