GeneralMarket Update

Nigerian Equities Market Update-02/05/18: Market Welcomes the Month of May Positively

Starting up the new month, equities trading on the floor of The Nigerian Stock Exchange ended in the positive territory. Total points added was 9Bpts as it rounded up trade at 41,306.02 from 41,268.01. It was a mixed performance amongst the observed market indices as shown in the index movement table. Week to Date, the lead activities index added 15Bpts while today’s gain marked the Month to Date returns. See the index movement table for details.

Value gained by the market capitalization of the listed equities during today’s trading activities was N13.768 billion, same as 9Bpts below the opening value.  Meanwhile, trading activities for the day produced 23 advancers and 15 lagers. NSEASI Year to Date gain is now 8.01% while the Market Capitalization Year to Date gain stood at N1.352 trillion same as 9.94% above the year’s opening value.

Leading from the just concluded month, major fundamental factors expected to dictate the market trend include; the 2018 first quarter financial performances of equities with December year end. Since a higher percentage of listed equities lined up in this group, we consider it a major determinant of market behavior in May. Another key market fundamental is the release of the headline inflation figure for the month of April, according to NBS timetable, the index will be made available to the public on 13th May, 2018, please note that we expect a more relaxing figure.

The leading fundamental factor for the month and the rest of the year 2018 is the national election coming up in the first quarter of next year. Although we expect calculated measures from the market regulators targeted towards erasing investors’ fear in this regard, it remains a major factor to watch out for.

Please understand that the usual investment culture after the first quarter earnings season is to smartly position in equities with half year incentives policies along other listed equities whose yearend and release dates fall between now and the end of June. To establish that such policy will hold, even for this half year, consult the recently released first quarter result of such companies for guidance.

As noted in our last report, market is currently making frantic attempt to run off a major support where it has traded for the better part of April. In our opinion, the probability of positive trend is high. On the strength of this, we maintained that traders should maintain positioning in tranches into their respective equities of choice. Safe Trade.

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