Domestic Equities Market: Bears Tighten Grip… ASI down 0.2% w/w

An Extraction of the Afrinvest Weekly Economic & Market Report for June 21st, 2024

Photo Credit: NGX

The local bourse closed the three-day trading week on a negative note as the NGX-ASI shed 0.2% w/w to close at 99,743.05 points. Likewise, market capitalisation shed 0.2% w/w to ₦56.4tn, while YTD return declined to 33.4%. Activity level improved as average volume and value traded rose 67.1% and 62.4% w/w to 1.1bn units and ₦17.7bn respectively. The top traded stocks by volume for the week were FBNH (1.3bn units), FIDELITY (1.3bn units), and VERITASKAP (193.3m units), while FBNH (₦28.4bn), FIDELITY (₦13.8bn), and GTCO (₦6.0bn) led by value.

Performance across sectors under our coverage was mixed as three indices gained while three lost. The Consumer Goods and Oil & Gas indices led gainers, up 0.3% and 0.2% w/w respectively, following price appreciation in CHAMPION (+32.5%), GUINNESS (+16.2%), ETERNA (+6.7%), and JAPAULGO (+1.6%). Following suit, the Industrial Goods index rose 0.1% w/w due to buying interest in JBERGER (+3.0%) and WAPCO (+2.5%). On the flip side, the Insurance and AFR-ICT indices shed 1.3% and 0.9% w/w respectively, driven by sell-offs on NEM (-17.3%), REGALINS (-10.6%) and MTNN (-2.7%). Trailing, price decline in FBNH (-6.4%) and UBA (-1.6%) dragged the Banking index lower by 4bps w/w.

Investor sentiment, as measured by market breadth, improved to 0.4x from 0.3x in the prior week as 53 stocks gained, 24 lost while 73 remained unchanged. CHAMPION (+32.5%), VERITASK (+31.1%), and CHAMS (+23.2%) led the top gainers while NEM (-17.3%), REGALINS (-10.6%), and TRANSCOH (-10.0%) led the decliners. In the last trading week of the month, we expect a mild bullish performance on the back of improved investor sentiment.