Stocks Market Opens the Week Negative, Loses N57.31bn

The Nigerian stocks market on Monday halt its gaining streak as the market capitalisation lost N57.31billion to close at N39.05trillion, weaker than N39.108 trillion recorded at the close last week’s trading activities.

Opening the week, the NGX All Share Index relapsed by 0.15 per cent to close at 71,008.70 points which was lower than 71,112.99 points posted on Friday.

Analysis of the closing figures, however, showed that selloffs in Tier-1 banking names ZENITHBANK (-0.75%), STANBIC (-7.08%) and UBA (-0.48%) offset demand for GTCO (+0.27%), GEREGU (+0.88%) and OANDO (+3.42%), driving the weak performance.

Consequently, the ASI’s year-to-date (YTD) return decreased to 38.55 per cent, while the yesterday’s market activities showed trade turnover settled lower relative to the previous session, with the value of transactions down by 27.77 per cent.

A total of 358.45million shares valued at N4.36billion were exchanged in 6,551 deals. ACCESSCORP (-0.58%) led the volume chart with 27.58million units traded while ZENITHBANK (-0.75%) led the value chart in deals worth N502.95million. Market breadth closed positive at a 2.27-to-1 ratio, with advancing issues outnumbering declining ones.

MECURE (+9.95%) topped thirty-three (33) others on the leader’s log, while RTBRISCOE (-9.84%) led fourteen (14) others on the laggard’s table.