Bears Take Control Of Equity Market As Investors Loss N5.36 Billion

Profit-taking activities that commenced on the floor of the NGX equity market on Tuesday continued yesterday as gains from UACN (+0.53%) and WAPCO (+0.4%) were wiped out by losses from MTNN (-0.42%) and ZENITH BANK (-0.83%). As a result of this outcome, the all-share index dipped by 0.03% away from its’ previous day position of 42,241.22 basis points to close at 42,233.82 basis points.

Despite investors' interest in UACN (+0.53%), UNITYBANK (+4.35%), and UBA (+1.27%), the dip still succeeded in preventing the ASI from reaching a critical resistance line of 42,500 basis points. Furthermore, this drop represents a 13.74bps drift from the previous day's figure of 42,241.22bps.

Continuing in that light, the ASI's gap from the 52-week high of 43,730.55 basis points (the highest resistance point) expanded by 1,496.73 basis points and drew nearer to the 52-week low of 34,250.74 basis points (the lowest support point) by 7,983.08 basis points.

Consequently, the Month-to-Date (M-t-D) and Week-to-Date (W-t-D) stayed negative at -2.52%, and -0.34% respectively, while the Year-to-Date (Y-t-D) maintained its growth momentum to +4.67%.

The general mood of traders affected the equity market so much that the total volume traded decreased by 5.76% to 211.1 million units, as against its previous day position of 224.0 million units traded. These shares were worth NGN2.5 billion and exchanged in 1,546 deals as against NGN2.7 billion traded on Wednesday.

Apparently, the equity market managed to curtail the loss to NGN5.36 billion to close at NGN22, 044.99 trillion, down from NGN22, 050.35 trillion the previous day.

Despite the market bearish closure, UACN (+0.53%) took most of the market attention as it dominated the volume and value activities chart with 65 million units traded, valued at NGN617.2 million.

Other notable stocks worthy of mention are ZENITH BANK with shares of 5.9 million units worth NGN144.6 million and MTNN with 1.9 million units worth NGN306.1 million traded.

Finally, as measured by market breadth, market sentiment was positive, as 14 companies’ stocks gained relative to 11 companies’ stocks lost.

UBN (+9.78%), ROYALEX (+7.14%), and MBENEFIT (+6.67%) generated the most profit for investors, while JBERGER (-9.88%), UPDC (-5.60%), and SOVRENINS (-4.00%) sustained the most losses.