The equity market last week continued its losing streak as investors prioritized spendings for Christmas, losing N48.7 billion to close market capitalisation at N21.9 trillion.
Analysts who spoke with Blueprint explained that small holders normally sell their shares to raise money for school fees of their children as well as buy other things during the festive period.
Okolie John, a shareholder said, he will be traveling and so will need some money for projects at home among others.
Despite gaining on three trading sessions in last week, the local bourse weakened as the benchmark index fell 0.7 per cent week-on-week )w/w) to 41,882.97 points.
Accordingly, Year-to-Date (YTD) return moderated to 4.0 per cent (previously; 4.7 per cent) while market capitalisation declined N148.7 billion w/w to N21.9 trillion.
Activity level improved as average volume and value traded rose 105.7 per cent and 55.1 per cent respectively to 444.9 million units and N3.4 billion.
The top traded stocks by volume were FBNH (1.2 billion units), STERLNBANK (261.0 million units), and GTCO (97.2 million units) while FBNH (N13.3 billion), ZENITH (N1.2bn), and SEPLAT (N845.3 million) led by value.
Performance of sectors within our coverage was bullish as five indices gained while the Industrial Goods index declined 5.4 per cent w/w on the back of sell-off in DANGCEM (-10.0 per cent). Leading the gainers, the Banking index rose 5.5 per cent w/w due to buying interest in GTCO (+10.0 per cent), ZENITH (+8.5 per cent), and UBA (+1.9 per cent).
Trailing, the AFRI-ICT and Oil & Gas indices advanced 2.2 per cent and 1.3 per cent w/w respectively following bargain hunting in MTNN (+4.5 per cent) and OANDO (+7.2 per cent). Similarly, gains in NEM (+7.6 per cent), MANSARD (+6.5 per cent), HONYFLOUR (+2.9 per cent), and PZ (+0.8 per cent) pushed the Insurance and Consumer Goods indices higher by 1.2 per cent and 0.1 per cent w/w respectively.
Investor sentiment as measured by market breadth (advance/decline ratio) strengthened to 1.2x from 0.3x recorded in the previous week as 31 stocks gained while 25 stocks lost.
The top outperformers for the week were MEYER (+50.0 per cent), ACADEMY (+20.5 per cent), and ROYALEX (+13.2 per cent) while UNITYBANK (-15.7 per cent), DANGCEM (-10.0 per cent), and LINKASSURE (-8.9 per cent) led the laggards.
