Profit Taking On MTN, WAPCO And Others Dips Equity Market By 0.4% On NSE

Bearish sentiments on Wednesday persisted in the domestic equities market, following profit taking on MTNN (-2.3%) and WAPCO (-7.1%) stocks.

Pertinently, the NSE ASI declined by 0.4% to 39,522.06 points. Consequently, the Month-to-Date and Year-to-Date losses increased to -0.7% and -1.9%, respectively.

The total volume traded increased by 9.8% to 244.34 million units, valued at NGN4.13 billion, and exchanged in 4,714 deals. ZENITHBANK was the most traded stock by volume and value at 41.38 million units and NGN1.06 billion, respectively.

According to Cordros Securities, performance across sectors was broadly negative, following losses across the Insurance (-0.9%), Consumer Goods (-0.5%) and Industrial Goods (-0.4%) indices. The Oil & Gas (+5.0) index was the lone gainer of the day while the Banking Index closed flat.

“As measured by market breadth, market sentiment remained negative (0.6x), as 29 tickers declined, relative to 16 gainers. NEM (-9.9%) and CHAMPION (-9.8%) topped the losers’ list, while SEPLAT (+10.0%) and AIICO (+5.2%) recorded the largest gains of the day.

CURRENCY

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The naira appreciated at the I&E window by 0.2% to NGN411.00/USD but was flat at NGN480.00/USD in the parallel market.

MONEY MARKET & FIXED INCOME

The overnight lending rate expanded by 280bps to 7.6%, in the absence of any significant inflows to the system.

The NTB secondary market was slightly bullish, as the average yield in the space pared by 1bp to 1.5%. Across the curve, average was flat at the short and long ends but declined at the mid (-4bps) segment due to demand for the benchmark 6-month bill. Similarly, the average yield pared by 2bps to 6.1% at the OMO secondary market.

The Treasury bonds secondary market was also bullish, as the average yield pared by 5bps to 9.0%. Across the curve, the average yield contracted at the short (-4bps), mid (-6bps) and long (-6bps) segments following buying interests in the APR-2023 (-14bps), FEB-2028 (-22bps) and JUL-2045 (-38bps) bonds, respectively.