Profit-taking by investors has put an end to the optimistic mood that has characterized the stock market this month. Specifically, the benchmark index fell by 0.43 percent to 52,214.62 points from 52,465.31 points due to selling of BUA Cement, which was down 8% for the week.
Additionally, the market value of listed stocks decreased by 0 48 percent (137 billion) to close at N28.431 trillion from N28.568 trillion.
The oil and gas (+5.2%), insurance (+1.2%), and consumer goods (+0.9%) sectors all outperformed the industrial goods (-2.1%) and banking (-1.3%) sectors in terms of performance, which was uneven.
However, the activity level stayed bullish with positive uptrend in the total weekly deals by 16.9 percent to 27,801 trades. In the same vein, the traded volumes advanced 21.14 percent to 3.60 billion units while the total traded valued went up by 33.58 percent to N30.49 billion.
At the conclusion of the week, C&I Leasing (20%), Access Bank Plc (12%), and BUA Cement (8%) lead the list of losers, while Ardova Plc (38%), Transcorp Plc (34%) and Multiverse (33%) led the list of gainers. The market performance is anticipated to remain erratic this week as investors rebalance their portfolios in light of the first-quarter (Q1’23) corporate results report, according to analysts at Cordros Capital. However, they noted that rising fixed income returns may still restrain consumer spending.
“Going into the new week, we anticipate a varied investor sentiment to linger on profit-taking and dividend payments to support buying interest, just as investors react to corporate earnings ahead of markdown dates, the April inflation report, and the Monetary Policy Committee meeting,” Cowry Asset Management analysts said.
