Nigeria Market Watch | June 10th 2015: Investors’ Appetite Stays Soft…NSE ASI slips 0.1%

Lagos, Nigeria (Capital Markets in Africa):- The Nigerian bourse slips 0.1%, trending southwards for the third consecutive session as bearish sentiment colored Banking and Industrial Goods bellwethers. However, market activity improved significantly as volume traded jumped 160.0% even as value traded rose 50.1% to 588.2m and N4.1bn respectively.

The Banking index declined the most, down 1.6% majorly due to losses in ZENITH (-3.3%), GUARANTY (-1.6%) and STANBIC (-3.6%). Similarly, the Industrial index shed 0.2% on 0.4% decline in WAPCO. On the contrary, the Oil & Gas index advanced the most, up 2.5% as a result of price appreciation in FORTE OIL (+9.2%). The Insurance and Consumer Goods sectors also added points, climbing 1.1% and 0.5% respectively as price appreciation was recorded in key counters in each of the sectors.

FORTE OIL (+9.2%), PZ (+5.0%) and LIVESTOCK (+4.9%) led the 18 advancing stocks while BETAGLAS (-5.0%), NAHCO (+5.0%) and WEMABANK (-4.8%) topped the losers’ league of 22 stocks. This brought advancers/decliners ratio to 0.8x. Although investors’ apathy appear softened as market sentiment berths close to unity, we expect the Nigerian equities market to continue to trade sideways till the much anticipated policy direction gives investors a clear outlook of the economy. Following the above, we advise investors to maintain a medium to long term position in equities.