Stock Investors Gain N372bn As Market Cap Hits N13trn
Investors raked in a total of N372bn on Tuesday as the market capitalisation of listed equities on the Nigerian Stock Exchange increased to N13.310tn on Tuesday from N12.938tn on Monday.
The All Share Index, also known as the benchmark index, rose above the 30,000 basis points mark to settle at 30,218.14bps.
The bullish run of the market was sustained into the fourth consecutive day as buying interests in MTN Nigeria, Dangote Cement Plc and Guaranty Trust Bank Plc drove the ASI up by 2.88 per cent.
The year-to-date loss moderated to -3.9 per cent as activity level improved with volume and value traded advancing by 56.9 per cent and 116.7 per cent, respectively.
Of the total of 335.600 million shares valued at N17.186bn that exchanged hands in 4,453 deals on the trading floor on Tuesday, 110.718 million shares were that of MTN Nigeria, which saw its share price increase by 11.95 per cent from N119.75 to N131.70.
Since its listing on Thursday at N90, the share price of MTN Nigeria has gained 41.7 per cent.
MTN Nigeria also led the top traded stocks by volume with 110.7 million units, followed by others such as FBN Holdings Plc (31.4 million units) and Sterling Bank Plc (26.1 million units).
MTN Nigeria (N14.6bn), GTB (N743.5m), and Dangote Cement (N621.5m) were the top traded stocks by value.
Across sectors, performance was largely positive as four out of five indices advanced, except for the consumer goods index, which declined by 0.33 per cent due to major losses in Unilever Nigeria Plc, Nigerian Breweries Plc and Vitafoam Nigeria Plc.
The industrial goods index led gainers, up by 2.08 per cent on the back of major price appreciation in Dangote Cement and Cement Company of Northern Nigeria Plc.
Bargain hunting in GTB, Union Bank Plc, Forte Oil Plc and Eterna Plc drove the positive performance of the banking and oil and gas indices, which were up 0.94 per cent and 0.53 per cent, respectively.
The insurance index gained 0.41 per cent.
Investor sentiment weakened to 0.8x, a mild decline from the 0.9x recorded on Monday as 16 stocks advanced against 20 losers.
The best performers were MTN Nigeria, Africa Prudential Plc, Thomas Wyatt Nigeria Plc, which saw respective gains of 10 per cent, 9.4 per cent and 8.8 per cent.
Livestock Feeds Plc, Juli Plc and Afromedia Plc led the top losers table as their share prices shed 10 per cent, 9.6 per cent and 8.9 per cent, respectively.
Analysts at Afrinvest Securities Limited said following sustained interest in MTN, they expected the bullish run in the equities market to continue.
