The Nigerian equities market recorded its first weekly gain in the month of February after three consecutive weeks of declines. The gain, was driven by investors re-investing in consumer goods companies which had been the subject of sell-offs in past weeks.
Excluding that, the investing landscape was generally quiet, with the locals unusually reluctant apparently in display of lack of confidence to the new policy of the central bank targeted to restrain the pacy depreciation of the naira at the parallel market and signaling intent to improve the availability of dollars to businesses.
Overall, the All Share Index gained by 85.46 points or 0.34 per cent to 25,250.37 points, while market capitalisation improved by N30 billion to settle at N8.739 trillion As stated above, increases in the prices of high-capped consumer goods stocks boosted the sector index to 4.1 per cent week-on-week gain.
Driving the performance of this category were Nigerian Breweries, Guinness and PZ Industries. The Insurance index followed with a weak gain of 0.33 per cent, driven by gains in the shares of Custodian and Allied Insurance and Mansard Insurance. The remaining three sector indices closed below previous levels, with Industrial Goods leading with 2.83 per cent loss, followed by oil and gas with a decline of 2.50 per cent and Banking index shed by 0.79 per cent.
Stocks Activities Movement For The Week
The stock market having gained in three of five sessions, closed the week on a positive side. The biggest gain of the week, 0.63 per cent, was recorded on Thursday, but was almost erased by a 0.62 per cent loss in the following session.
Market breadth was negative, with 17 gainers versus 32 losers. Total volume traded reduced by 28.8 per cent to 764.5 million shares while the value of trades increased by 12.87 per cent to N9.72 billion.
The best performers for the week were Nigerian Breweries by 13.04 per cent gain, Guinness followed with a gain of 11.57 per cent and NPF Micro Finance Bank appreciated by 9.26 per cent. On the other side, Unilever depreciated by 16.18 per cent, Forte Oil shed 14.96 per cent and Vitafoam dipped by 14 per cent were the worst performers.
Outlook for the week
Analysts from Afrinvest said that, “Despite positive performance in the consumer goods sector index this week, investors are still wary about full year, 2016 earnings due to pressure on production cost and finance expenses. However we see a likely rebound in Nestle which has tumbled 33.7 per cent year-to-date. While analysts from Crodros Capital added that last week’s gain notwithstanding, market mood does not suggest that the rally will be sustained.