Local stock dips by 0.7% as investors lose $258.4mln in Nigeria

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Equities trading at the Nigerian Exchange Limited (NGX) began the week on a bearish trend, reversing previous gains.

The local stock market opened the trading week in negative territory, with the All-Share Index (ASI) declining by 0.73 percent to 97,881.75 points.

The market capitalization of listed equities fell by the same margin to N55.58 trillion, resulting in investor losses of N410.96 billion.

Among individual stocks, major gainers included Julius Berger, Nascon, Total Energies, Oando, and Dangote Sugar, with share price increases of 10.00 percent, 10.00 percent, and 9.98 percent, respectively.

Conversely, NAHCO, Sunu Assurance, Coronation Insurance, and CWG led the losers’ chart with declines of 9.93 percent, 5.43 percent, 4.76 percent, 2.53 percent, and 2.38 percent, respectively.

Sectoral performance was mixed. The Oil/Gas index led with a 3.30 percent gain, driven by increases in Total Energies and Eternal.

This was followed by the Insurance and Consumer Goods indexes, which advanced by 2.05 percent and 1.00 percent, respectively.

However, the Industrial Goods index dropped by 3.96 percent due to sell-offs in BUA Cement, Lafarge Africa, and Cutix, while the Banking Index declined slightly by 0.31 percent.

Despite the overall downturn, trading activity on the NGX showed positive momentum, with a higher number of 29 gainers compared to 20 losers.

The total trade value surged by 44.11 percent to N11.77 billion, while the number of deals and traded volume rose by 11.71 percent and 4.36 percent, respectively, reaching 10,645 deals and 498.27 million units.

At the close of the session, Guaranty Trust Holding Company was the most traded stock by volume and value, with 123.92 million units worth N5.66 billion exchanged in 739 deals.