Equities trading on the floor of The Nigerian Stock Exchange rounded up in the negative territory as the lead performance index NSEASI gave up 161Bpts of its trading points and closed at 32,190.07 from 32,715.20. All observed market indices in this report closed below their respective opening points. Thus, total points gained in the month of February adjusted down to 534Bpts. See the index movement table for details.
Value loss by the market capitalization of the listed equities during today’s trading activities was N195.834 billion, same as 161Bpts below the opening value. Meanwhile, trading activities for the day produced 12 ADVANCERS and 37 LAGERS. NSEASI Year to Date gain is now 2423Bpts while the Market Capitalization Year to Date gain stood at N283.455 billion same as 242Bpts below the year’s opening value.
Having received the first shocking event in the long feared national election, traders quickly run off with the remaining profit from the recent bull-run, while others panicked off the market not minding the loss suffered. Recall that the national electoral commission (INEC) postponed the presidential election by one week only few hours to the earlier scheduled time. In our opinion, this confirmed investors’ fear towards the election, which dented market fundamentals through the first trading month of the year. Please understand that, as we speak most equities fundamentals are intact except for those with unimpressive earnings performance, but in the fear of the election shock, traders preferred holding cash in less risky investments. We therefore maintained our recommendation of heightened cautiousness around the market arena.
As at the time we compiled this report, Brent Crude trades at $63.86/bbl having gained 0.25% above the last close price.
At the interbank rate today, the Naira closed unchanged at N306.80 against the dollar, representing 2Bpts depreciation from last close points. See below table for BDC rates by four major locations within the country. Meanwhile, the I&E FX Window started from N361.75 traded as high as N363.25 before rounding up at N362.07, having transacted a total of $202.14 million through the day. Please note that, margin between the close and open value is an equivalent of 12Bpts 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 26.08%, same as 8.58% below the previous closing position. Meanwhile, Open Buy-Back (OBB) rate ended at 23.33%, that is, 7.50% 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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