The Nigerian Exchange Limited closed lower last week as investors took stock of the hike in the Monetary Policy Rate by the Monetary Policy Committee of the Central Bank of Nigeria and continued with their profit-taking.
At the end of the trading activities last week, the market capitalisation declined by N13bn.
The All-Share Index closed 0.04 per cent lower at 54,892.53 compared to the 54,915.39 that it started the week with.
Similarly, all other indices finished lower except for NGX Consumer Goods and NXG Growth which appreciated by 1.11 per cent and 2.90 per cent respectively while the NGX ASeM, NGX Oil and Gas indices and NGX Sovereign Bond index closed flat.
The NGX ASI went up slightly on Wednesday, a day after the new MPR rate was announced but it continued to dip till the close of trading on Friday.
A total turnover of 1.689 billion shares worth N11.066bn in 14,019 deals was traded the past week by investors on the floor of the Exchange, in contrast to a total of 853.745 million shares valued at N11.841bn that exchanged hands the previous week in 18,543 deals.
The healthcare industry (measured by volume) led the activity chart with 1.086 billion shares valued at N1.627bn traded in 267 deals; thus contributing 64.32 per cent and 14.70 per cent to the total equity turnover volume and value respectively.
The financial services industry followed with 379.556 million shares worth N4.547bn in 6,711 deals. The third place was the conglomerates industry, with a turnover of 89.526 million shares worth N131.231m in 534 deals.
Trading in the top three equities namely Neimeth International Pharmaceuticals Plc, Transnational Corporation Plc and United Bank for Africa Plc, (measured by volume) accounted for 1.248 billion shares worth N2.347bn in 1,102 deals, contributing 73.89 per cent and 21.21 per cent to the total equity turnover volume and value respectively.
Twenty-eight equities appreciated during the week higher than 19 equities in the previous week.
27 equities depreciated lower than 47 in the previous week, while 102 equities remained unchanged, higher than 91 equities recorded in the previous week.
The top gainer in the past week was Sunu Assurances Nigeria Plc which gained 9.09 per cent to end the week at N0.48. Lasaco Assurance Plc followed with a 7.14 per cent increase in its share capital to close at N1.05, while on the losers’ table, NCR Nigeria Plc lost 18.69 per cent of its share value to end the week at N2.35, and Ikeja Hotel lost 18.25 per cent to close at N1.03.
SOURCE: THE PUNCH
