Investors’ Interest in BUA Cement Adds N355bn to Market Cap
Kayode Tokede
Opening the new week, the stock market segment of the Nigerian Exchange Limited (NGX) yesterday rebounded by N355 billion on investors’ interest in BUA Cement Plc and 25 others.
About 10 per cent or N9.40 gain in BUA Cement stock to N103.40per share, lifted the NGX All-Share Index (ASI) by 646.76 basis points or 0.97 per cent to close at 67,101.33 basis points from 66,454.57 basis points the closed for trading last week.
Also, market capitalisation gained N355 billion to close at N36.865 trillion from N36.510trillion the stock market opened for trading.
Accordingly, the stock market Month-to-Date and Year-to-Date returns advanced to 1.1per cent and 30.9per cent, respectively.
Performance across the sectors was broadly positive as the NGX Industrial Goods added four per cent, NGX Insurance rose by 1.2per cent, NGX Consumer Goods added 0.8per cent and NGX Oil & Gas appreciated by 0.4per cent, while the NGX Banking index depreciated by 0.4per cent, a sole loser of the day.
Investor sentiment, as measured by market breadth closed positive as 26 stocks advanced, while 23 declined. BUA Cement emerged the highest price gainer of 10 per cent to close at N103.40, per share. Consolidated Hallmark Insurance followed with a gain of 9.80 per cent to close at N1.12, while Nigerian Breweries rose by 9.09 per cent to close at N42.00, per share.
John Holt increased by 8.11 per cent to close at N1.60, while SUNU Assurance appreciated 7.22 per cent to close at N1.04, per share. On the other side, Prestige Assurance led the losers’ chart with 10 per cent to close at 45 kobo, per share. FTN Cocoa Processors followed with a decline of 8.33 per cent to close at N1.65, while NEIMETH International Pharmaceuticals shed 7.74 per cent to close at N1.55, per share.
Sovereign Trust Insurance depreciated by 5.00 per cent to close at 38 kobo, while eTranzact International down by 4.26 per cent to close at N9.00, per share.
The total volume traded dipped by 28.18 per cent to 268.664 million units, valued at N3.464 billion, and exchanged in 6,911 deals. Transactions in the shares of Associated Bus Company led the activity with 29.269 million shares worth N19.908 million. Access Holdings followed with account of 29.172 million shares valued at N465.977 million, while Oando traded 27.090 million shares valued at N252.976 million.
United Bank for Africa (UBA) traded 23.752 million shares worth N407.671 million, while Transnational Corporation (Transcorp) traded 23.735 million shares worth N149510 million.
This week, analysts at United Capital Plc said, “we expect the renewed buy-interests across the equities market to linger. We anticipate investors taking positions ahead of the Q3, 2023 earnings season as corporates are set to release impressive financials. Hence, we recommend cherry-picking activities around fundamentally sound stocks with solid performance.”
