Market slumps, records twice more losers than gainers

The number of equities that declined on Monday is more than twice the number that gained.

According to the market report, bears remained firmly in control  as  the new week started on a weak note as most stock prices headed south.

Market breadth settled at 0.44x (16 stocks advanced while 36 stocks declined) to send a signal of no possible reversal of the bears’ grip on the market. At the close of trading, the All Share Index shed a total of 14bps to settle at 36,526.73pts while the market capitalization decreased by NGN16.272bn to close at NGN11.568tn.

The volume and value of transactions also declined relative to the last trading day’s figures. At the halt of trading session, 158.04mn units of shares were traded while the turnover of transactions was NGN2.38bn implying a 35.19% and 21.91% drop in volume and value respectively. While mostly banking and consumer goods stocks featured on the top ten trades by volume, DANGCEM alone accounted for 32.47% of the total value of transactions.

Sectors had a mixed outing today as the Oil and gas, Industrial, Agriculture and Health sectors traded positive while the Banking, Insurance and Conglomerate sectors remained southward as indicated by the NSE and MERI sectoral indices. We believe the market will still remain quiet in the week as there are no feasible fundamental drivers that could spur the market in the positive direction. However, we are of the view that sentiments may favour some stocks that present attractive entry points.

We believe the market will still remain quiet in the week as there are no feasible fundamental drivers that could spur the market in the positive direction. However, we are of the view that sentiments may favour some stocks that present attractive entry points. We therefore see a Deer market in the week as the market is likely to close sideways.