Trading activities on the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) on Monday ended on a downward trend after several weeks of consistent growth.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that this was as a result of the drop recorded in the market indices by 0.42 per cent.
The market capitalisation dropped by N30 billion, representing 0.42? per cent, to close at N7.198 trillion as against N7.228 trillion recorded on Friday.
Also, the All-Share Index opened market with 22,665.99 points and depreciated by 94.21 basis points, representing 0.42 per cent, to close at 22,571.78 as a result of price losses.
Nigerian Breweries led the losers’ chart recording a loss of N2.67 to close at N110.13 per share.
Zenith ranked second dropping by 63k to close at N14.90, while GTB dropped by 34k to close at N16.70 per share.
Cement Company of Northern Nigeria (CCNN) lost 19k to close at N4.81, while UACN dipped by 13k to close at N33.99 per share.
Some analysts attributed the downward trend to profit taking by short-term investors, who were taking advantage of the recent price rally.
On the other hand, NewGold led the gainers’ chart gaining N5 to close at N2, 518 per unit.
Ashaka Cement followed with 39k to close at N11, while International Breweries rose by 27k to close at N5.68 per share.
Dangote Flour and Access appreciated by 22k each to close at N4.96 and N7 per share respectively.
In spite of the drop recorded by the market indices, volume of shares traded increased by 5.59 per cent with 746.42 million shares worth N6.07 billion exchanged in 5,133 deals.
This was against 706.87 million shares valued N4.88 billion traded in 4,234 deals on Friday.
The financial services sector was investors’ delight with 694.68 million shares worth N5.44 billion exchanged in 3,453 deals.
The banking sub-sector of the financial services was the most active accounting for 671.35 million shares valued N5.43 billion traded in 3,338 deals.
UBA was the most traded with a total of 164.22 million shares worth N694.65 million exchanged in 443 deals.
FBN trailed with a turnover of 164.16 million shares valued N1.99 billion traded in 820 deals.
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