Salamatu Ejembi, Lagos Last updated Sep 25, 2023

The Nigerian equities market commenced this week’s trading activities with a bearish close as the benchmark index declined by 0.7%.

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Monday’s transactions saw the market capitalisation shedding off ₦242 billion Naira or 0.7% (0.66) to close at ₦36,605 trillion Naira as against Friday’s ₦36,847 trillion Naira.

The All-Share Index also declined by 0.7% (0.66) or 441.95 basis points to close at 66,882.64 basis points today in comparison to Friday’s 67,324.59 basis points.

Today’s market weak performance was driven by profit-taking activities in telco heavyweight MTN NIGERIA COMMUNICATIONS PLC (-1.67%) alongside ACCESS HOLDINGS PLC(-9.86%), ZENITH BANK PLC (-1.54%) and GUARANTY TRUST HOLDING COMPANY PLC (-0.42%).

By the close of business, investors traded 408.19 million units of shares, valued at ₦5.44 billion, and exchanged in 7,707 deals.

ACCESS HOLDINGS PLC(-9.86%) led the volume and value charts with 113.39m units of shares traded in deals worth ₦1.78bn.

As measured by market breadth, market sentiment was negative as 36 stocks lost relative to 15 gainers.

CAVERTON OFFSHORE SUPPORT GRP PLC (-9.87%) and ACCESS Holdings Plc(-9.86%) topped the losers’ list, while IKEJA HOTEL PL (+10.00%) and JOHN HOLT PLC (+9.70%) recorded the highest gains of the day.

Sectoral performance was mixed, as the Banking (-3.2%) and Consumer Goods (-0.1%) declined, while the Insurance (+0.2%) and Industrial Goods (+0.1%) indices advanced. Meanwhile, the Oil & Gas index closed flat.