Investors’ bargain hunting helps NGX sustain bullish run
Analysts see strong appetite favouring bulls this week
A STRONG INVESTOR SEN TIMENT is expected to firmly favour the bulls this week as the market resumes on Tuesday after the Monday holiday, declared by the federal government to mark Democracy Day, which fell on a Saturday this year.
Similarly, profit-taking activities in early trades is anticipated following last week’s performance on the local bourse, which analysts believed will be short-lived before the end of the week on account of bargain hunting by equities investors.
However, credit to the projections, the bullish trend in the domestic equities market was extended as the NSE All-Share Index rose 1.1 percent week on week to settle at 39,156.28 points, while market year to date loss moderated to -2.8 percent. The positive performance was driven by bargain hunting in notable bellwether stocks such as Dangote Cement, which rose 4.5 percent to N230 per share; Wapco Plc, Stanbic IBTC and Seplat Petroleum.
As a result, the NGX market capitalisation rose by N224.2 billion week on week to close at N20.40 trillion. The trading activity level was mixed as average volume fell 1.8 percent week on week to 289.1 milway lion units, while value traded rose 34.9 percent week on week to N3.5 billion. The top traded stocks by volume were Zenith Bank (79.3 million units), Sterling Bank (52.6 million units) and Fidelity Bank (48.7 million units); while Nestle Plc (N2.1 billion), Zenith Bank (N1.8 billion) and GTBank (N1.0 billion) topped trades by value.
On the sectoral fronts, gains across the markets were broad-based with four sectors of a possible six closing higher by the end of the week with the industrial goods sector leading the of the gainers, up to 2.4 per cent week on week due to buying interest in Cutix Plc (+23.6%), Dangote Cement (+4.5%) and Wapco plc (+2.9%). In a similar manner, the oil & gas and consumer goods indices advanced 1.4 percent and 1.1 percent week on week respectively following price appreciation in Conoil Plc (+9.6%), Seplat Plc (+1.5%), PZ Cussons (+9.1%) and Unilever Nigeria Plc (+7.6%).
Gains in Stanbic IBTC (+6.1%) and Union Bank of Nigeria (+5.5%) buoyed the banking index as it rose by 0.9 per cent from the previous week following a week of mixed interests in the space. On the other hand, the insurance and ICT indices closed in the red, down 4.1 per cent and 0.7 per cent from the prior week respectively, on account of sell-offs in NEM Insurance (-13.5%), Wapic Insurance (-6.8%) and MTN Nigeria (-1.4%).
However, investor sentiment, as measured by the advanced and decline ratio of the market breadth, strengthened to 1.1x from 1.0x recorded at the previous week’s close and consequently, on 35 stocks advancing against 31 that declining. The top-performing stocks for the week were Cutix Plc (+23.6%), Okomu Oil (+20.7%), and Morison Industries (+9.7%) while CWG Plc (-26.1%), FTN Cocoa Processing Company (-15.4%), and NEM Insurance (-13.5%) led laggards.
Elsewhere, on the NGX 30 Index, the sector decreased by 1.36 percent to close at 1,594.62 points as against 1,573.18 points on the previous week’s close. Market turnover closed the week with a traded volume of 149.96 million units as Stanbic IBTC and International Breweries emerged as the key gainers, while Fidelity Bank and MTN Nigeria were the key losers at the end of the week.