FG-listed Bonds Hit N6.82tn in First Quarter

• FG-listed Bonds Hit N6.82tn in First Quarter

The listed bonds of the Federal Government on the Nigerian Stock Exchange as of March 31 this year were N6.82tn.

The figure, according to findings by our correspondent, was generated from a total of 20 listings on the bourse.

Following a series of monetary policy actions to boost liquidity and rate convergence in the foreign exchange market, the NSE marked a positive market performance in the first quarter and saw monthly turnover reach a two-year high of N142.56bn in March this year.

In the first three months of the year, the average daily value traded across all products on the NSE increased by 47.58 per cent to N3.56bn, from N2.41bn in the previous year.

However, the average daily volume traded declined by 45.18 per cent to 308.94 million units from 563.53 million units in the first quarter of 2016, indicating more high value/low volume trades in the first three months of 2017 compared to the previous year.

At the end of the quarter, the average price earnings ratio of the Exchange’s listed equities stood at 18.83 compared to 13.98 in the previous year.

The equity turnover velocity also increased by 3.45 percentage points to 10.28, from 6.83 per cent in Q1 2016.

The dividend yield for the period ending March 31, 2017 was 5.97 per cent, compared to 6.93 per cent for the previous year.

The Debt Management Office, at the end of the first quarter listed about 2.1 billion units of FGN savings bond series 1 on the NSE, just as 100,000 units were traded after listing.

The Director-General, DMO, Dr. Abraham Nwankwo, had commended Nigerians for participating in the first issuance of the bond on March 13, 2017.

“This is the first time that the Federal Government ensured that the common Nigerians participate in a bond and about 75 per cent of these deals were from ordinary Nigerians,” he had said.

The Savings Bond, the first of its kind in Nigeria, was opened to the investing public by way of offer for subscription over a five-day offer period starting from Monday, March 13 to March 17, 2017, and N2,067,961,000 was raised from the retail market at 13.01 per cent coupon.