MON. 03 APRIL 2023-theGBJournal | Nigerian markets started the week on bearish note, and on day oil prices surged above $84. The bearish sentiment forced the equities market into negative territory.
All other markets wobbled too as the naira closed weak against the dollar while the FGN bonds secondary market and Nigerian Treasury bills secondary market traded on a mixed note.
The All-Share index closed lower by 0.1% to 54.184.34 points. Today’s performance was undermined by losses in INTBREW (-6.7%) and ETI (-3.1%). Thus, the Month-to-Date and Year-to-Date returns settled at -0.1% and +5.7%, respectively.
The total volume traded declined by 47.6% to 292.56 million units, valued at NGN2.38 billion, and exchanged in 4,408 deals. FIDELITYBK was the most traded stock by volume and value at 79.73 million units and NGN426.80 million, respectively.
Sectoral performance was mixed, as the Oil & Gas (-0.3%), Consumer Goods (-0.3%), and Banking (-0.3%) indices settled lower, while the Industrial Goods index closed flat. The Insurance (+0.3%) index was the sole gainer for the day.
As measured by market breadth, market sentiment was negative (0.8x), as 22 tickers lost relative to 17 gainers. SCOA (-10.0%) and UACN (-10.0%) recorded the most significant losses of the day, while MANSARD (+10.0%) and LASACO (+10.0%) topped the gainer’s list.
The naira depreciated by 0.5% to N463.50/USD at the I&E window.
The overnight lending rate contracted by 100bps to 17.9%, in the absence of any significant inflow into the system.
The Nigerian Treasury bills secondary market traded on a mixed note, albeit with a bearish tilt, as the average yield expanded slightly by 1bp to 7.8%. Across the curve, the average yield closed flat at the short and mid segments but expanded at the long (+2bps) end following the sell-off of the 339DTM (+24bps) bill. Elsewhere, the average yield was flat at 4.0% in the OMO segment.
Meanwhile, the FGN bonds secondary market closed on a bearish note, as the average yield expanded by 3bps to 13.4%. Across the benchmark curve, the average yield increased at the short (+2bps) and long (+5bps) ends due to profit-taking activities on the MAR-2024 (+12bps) and APR-2037 (+20bps) bonds, respectively. Conversely, the average yield was flat at the mid segment.
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