LAGOS, JULY 27, 2016 – Major blue chip companies on the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) on Tuesday posted huge gains reversing the six days negative trend.This led to appreciation of the equity market by N108 billion in spite of the increase in the Monetary Policy Rate (MPR).
Market capitalisation rose by N108 billion or 1.14 per cent to close at N9.597 trillion compared with N9.489 trillion achieved on Monday.
Also, the All-Share Index which opened at 27,629.90 improved by 315.12 points or 1.14 per cent to close at 27,945.02.
At the end of trading, Nigerian Breweries recorded the highest price gain leading the gainers’ table with a gain of N1.63 to close at N146.54 per share.
Guaranty Trust Bank came second with N1.06 to close at N22.36, while Ecobank Transnational garnered N1.06 to close at N13.43 per share.
Zenith Bank improved by 74k to close at N16.39 and Oando grew by 57k to close at N6.20 per share.
On the other hand, Seplat recorded the highest loss, shedding N15.67 to close at N297.83 per share.
7UP trailed with a loss of N6.45 to close at N134 and Lafarge Africa lost 24k to close at N59 per share.
Air Service shed 10k to close at N1.30 and Fidson Health care dropped by 6k to close at N1.94k.
United Bank for Africa was the toast of investors with a total of 76.91 million shares valued at N349.94 million.
It was followed by Access Bank which traded 42.75 million shares worth N231.02 million and Zenith Bank sold 28.19 million shares valued at N457.18 million.
FBNHoldings exchanged 25.35 million shares valued at N59.87 million and Transcorp transacted 18.93 million shares worth N28.53 million.
The volume of shares traded closed lower as investors bought and sold 286.72 million shares valued at N2.34 billion exchanged in 4,316 deals.
This was in contrast to a total of 378.51 million shares worth N2.27 billion achieved in 3,519 deals on Monday.
In his comments, Mr Ambrose Omordion, the Chief Operating Officer, InvestData Ltd., said that investors and analysts have yet to analyse the impact of the MPR increase to 14 per cent on the market.
Omordion said that investors had anticipated that the MPR would be retained, noting that the impact would be visible soon.
The Monetary Policy Committee of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) at the conclusion of the MPC July’s meeting increased MPR by 200bps to 14 per cent.
The committee retained the Cash Reserve Requirement (CRR) at 22.5 per cent and maintained liquidity ratio at 30 per cent.
