Despite decline in market index, investors’ wealth grew by N7.7bn

Despite losing three of five trading sessions last week, investors on equities market of the Nigerian Exchange Limited (NGX) grew their wealth by N7.67billion.

At the last trading session of the week under review, the domestic bourse extended losses as the market benchmark index declined by 0.65 per cent to close at 65,056.39 points.

This is due to the bearish sentiments in market heavyweight, MTNN (-1.13%) alongside ZENITHBANK (-2.86%), and GTCO (-1.20%), who were the top drivers of the market plunge.

But the All-Share Index (ASI) closed 0.08 per cent higher week on week (w/w), extending gains for the second consecutive week.

Although, the ASI Year-To-Date (YTD) return fell to 26.94 per cent, but the market capitalization gained N7.67billio w/w to close at N35.40trillion.

Analysis of last week’s trading activities, showed that the major drivers of the week’s gain include; MTN Nigeria shares, recording +0.74 per cent w/w, GEREGU posted +3.60 w/w, while SEPLAT up +20.99 per cent w/w.

This outweighed losses in ZENITHBANK -3.27 per cent w/w, GTCO -3.77 per cent w/w and ACCESSCORP -4.63 per cent w/w.

However, analysis of the Friday’s market activities showed trade turnover settled higher relative to the previous session, with the value of transactions up by 11.46 per cent.

A total of 459.77million shares valued at N5.35billion were exchanged in 8,051 deals, while United Bank for Africa (UBA) -2.03% led the volume and value charts with 57.62million units traded in deals worth N832.31million.

Market breadth closed negative at a 1.88-to-1 ratio with declining issues outnumbering advancing ones. CHAMS -10.00 per cent topped 31 others on the laggard’s log, while COURTVILLE +10.00 per cent led 16 others on the leader’s table.