By Olawunmi Ashafa
Bearish sentiment continued at the Nigerian stock market on Wednesday following sell-off in Okumu Oil and Fidelity Bank stocks.
Specifically, the market capitalisation lost N9 billion or 0.03 per cent to close at N28.558 trillion from N28.567 trillion on Tuesday.
Also, the All-Share Index (ASI) declined by 16.13 points or 0.03 per cent to close at 52,974.15 against 52,990.28 on Tuesday.
Accordingly, the year-to-date returns increased to 24 per cent.
Performance across sectoral coverage indices was broadly negative, as the Insurance dropped by 0.5 per cent, Banking fell 0.3 per cent and Oil and Gas declined by 0.2 per cent.
The Consumer Goods rose by 0.1 per cent index, making it the sole gainer, while the Industrial Goods index was flat.
Overall, the market was negative with 19 losers relative to 13 gainers.
Eternal Oil drove the gainers’ chart in percentage terms by 9.90 per cent to close at N7.44 per share.
FTNCocoa followed with a gain 9.38 per cent to close at 35k, while NAHCO rose by 8.57 per cent to close at N7.22 per share.
Ikeja Hotel went up by 7.83 per cent to close at N1.24, while Transcorp appreciated by four per cent to close at N1.30, per share.
On the other hand, Okumu Oil led the losers’ chart in percentage terms by 10 per cent to close at N193.50 per share.
NCR followed with 9.77 per cent to close at N3.60 per share.
Conoil shed 8.35 per cent to close at N29.10, while Neimeth and Fidelity Bank lost 7.19 per cent and 4.71 per cent each to close at N1.55 and N3.24 per share, respectively.
Also, the total volume traded declined by 7.2 per cent to 295.35 million units valued at N3.59 billion and exchanged in 4,637 deals.
Transactions in the shares of Transcorp topped the activity chart with 121.84 million shares valued at N156.15 million.
Guaranty Trust Holding Company followed with 20.12 million shares worth N454.75 million, while Conoil traded 16.96 million shares valued at N493.42 million.
Sterling Bank traded 16.05 million shares valued at N23.7 million, while Royal Exchange 11.83 transacted million shares worth N11.02 million. (NAN)