Starting off the first trading day of the week, equities trading on the floor of The Nigerian Stock Exchange rounded up in the positive territory. Thus, the lead performance pointer NSEASI added 95Bpts to close at 32,129.94 from 31,827.24. Safe NSE-Insurance and NSE-Lotus II index that shed points other observed market indices closed above their respective opening points. The total gained point during the two trading days observed so far in the month of March is now 129Bpts. See the index movement table for details.
Value gained by the market capitalization of the listed equities during today’s trading activities was N112.883 billion, same as 95Bpts above the opening value. Meanwhile, trading activities for the day produced 25 ADVANCERS and 10 LAGERS. NSEASI Year to Date gain is now 223Bpts while the Market Capitalization Year to Date gain stood at N261.034 billion same as 223Bpts above the year’s opening value.
Although the three days pull back action observed before Friday trading activities was necessary for strength, the two days recovery momentum are weak. Recall that, the market pulled back after several failed attempts to break a major resistance (around 32,644), and then we noted the need for a pull back to generate strength capable of challenging the said resistance, as can be seen from the daily movement chart (see full report), the two days gained points still struggled to erase the loss suffered on Thursday 28th February, 2018. We are of the opinion that, as the market starts receiving fourth quarter score cards from listed equities with December financial year, the said resistance will be tackled appropriately. In other words, the possibilities of the resistance holding the market down remain high for now.
As at the time we compiled this report, Brent Crude trades at $66.26/bbl having loss 0.13% to stand above the last close price.
At the interbank rate today, the Naira closed at N306.90 against the dollar having recorded 0.02% depreciation from Friday’s close. See below table for BDC rates by four major locations within the country. Meanwhile, the I&E FX Window started from N361.42 traded as high as N362.00 before rounding up at N360.98, having transacted a total of $1.89 billion through the day. Please note that, margin between the close and open value is an equivalent of 1Bpts gain. We are of the opinion that the FX-Market will trade within same range tomorrow.
In the money market, the Overnight (O/N) rate closed at 14.92%, same as 2.50% below the previous closing position. Meanwhile, Open Buy-Back (OBB) rate ended at 14.00%, that is, 2.33% below the previous close. We are of the opinion that the money market will maintain this range on the next business day. Safe Trade.
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