The Nigerian Exchange Limited (NGX) closed in the green on Wednesday on strong bullish sentiments as investors N41 billion at the end of the trading session.
The market capitalization and the All-Share Index, reflecting the overall health of the market, both registered a 0.12 percent rise at the close of Wednesday’s trading, reaching N34.973 trillion and 64,267.36 points, respectively.
Nevertheless, not all indicators closed in the green as the number of deals, trading volume, and their total value experienced a negative trend, declining by 21.22 percent, 56.60 percent, and 44.62 percent, respectively, compared to the previous day’s figures. The year-to-date returns still stood at 25.28 percent
The trading session saw 31 stocks on the gainers’ side, outnumbering the 26 losers, indicating a generally positive market sentiment.
Leading the pack of gainers were AbbeyBDS, Chams, and NASCON, with their share prices soaring by 10 percent each, settling at N1.21, N0.99, and N35.50, respectively. Sky Aviation and Dangote Sugar closely followed, gaining 9.96 percent and 9.93 percent in share value, closing at N28.15 and N32.65, respectively.
Conversely, paper company Thomas Wyatt and TIP found themselves at the losing end, both experiencing a 10 percent drop in market value, closing at N1.17 and N0.72, respectively.
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UPL also witnessed a significant decline of 9.78 percent in share value, settling at N2.49. Omatek and John Holt followed suit, losing 9.76 percent and 9.44 per cent, concluding at N0.37 and N1.63, respectively.
When questioned about the market’s performance, Garba Kurfi, the Managing Director/ Chief Executive Officer of APT Securities, noted that despite the poor performance of some listed companies following the release of their half-year reports, there remains a positive outlook for the overall market.
He said, “The market outlook is good for two reasons. The performance of many of the companies is still beyond expectations and as long as there is inflation, it is likely that we will see the small stocks and penny stock rally up and we have seen that.
“Most of the penny stocks that were trading 20 kobo are no longer there. They are moving fast and better. That is the trend for an inflationary economy and you remember that our economy is cost-push inflation and when you have that, it affects our capital market, especially the small-cap and penny stocks.”