Activities at Nigerian Stock Exchange on Monday, February 26, 2018
EQUITIES
The equities market started the week on a positive note, with the ASI appreciating marginally by 0.02% to 42,579.48 points.
Accordingly, the Month-to-Date and Year-to-Date returns improved to -3.98% and 11.34% respectively.
The Consumer Goods (+0.78%), Insurance (+0.49%), and Banking (+0.28%) indices recorded gains, owing to demands for the shares of PZ (+5.00%), WAPIC (+2.94%), and ZENITHBANK (+0.78%) respectively. Unimpressive Q4-17 earnings caused selloffs of TOTAL (-4.82%) shares, with the Oil & Gas index recording negative returns, while profit taking in DANGCEM (-0.38%) stocks weighed on the Industrial Goods (-0.17%) index.
Market breadth turned negative, with 21 gainers and 26 loses, led by JAPAULOIL (+9.52%) and COURTVILLE (-6.25%). Total volume of trades increased by 24.78% to 384.86 million units, valued at NGN5.47 billion, and exchanged in 4,774 deals.
Amidst still-positive macroeconomic fundamentals, we look to continued gains; more so, as the Q4-17 earnings season draws closer.
CURRENCY
The USD/NGN depreciated by 0.28% to NGN363 in the parallel market, while it strengthened by 0.14% to NGN360.19 in the I&E FX window. Total turnover in the I&E FX window improved by 10.54% to USD155.88 million, traded within the range of NGN345 to NGN364.50. Meanwhile, the apex bank intervened in the Retail Secondary Market Intervention Sales (SMIS) with USD321.4 billion on Friday.
FIXED INCOME AND MONEY MARKET
The overnight lending rate dropped by 358 bps to 8.83%, against Friday’s close of 12.42%, as a result of inflows from the monthly FAAC disbursement.
The treasury bills market saw average yield fall by 2 bps to14.16%, as yield contractions at the mid (-9 bps) and long (-1bp) ends of the curve outweighed expansions at the short (+4 bps) segment. Notable bills include the94DTM (+-58 bps), 185DTM (-17 bps), and 24DTM (+38bps) bills respectively.
Conversely, activities were bearish in the bond market, as average yield rose2 bps to 13.67%. Yields expanded across all ends of the curve – short (+2 bps), mid (+1 bp), and long (+2 bps) – driven by selloffs of the JUN-2019 (+5 bps), JUL-2030 (+7 bps), and MAR-2036 (+7 bps) bonds respectively.
