Bear took over activities on Nigeria’s equities market on Wednesday, dragging down the main market index due to sell-offs in some telecom firms, including Airtel, and two banking giants, Access Corporation and GTCO.
The main market index, the All-Share Index (ASI), closed lower by 0.47 percent at the close of trading on Wednesday.
The ASI closed at 64,625.28 points, marking its third successive session decline.
Shares in telecom firm Airtel fell 5.30 percent, GTCO weakened 0.53 percent, and Access Corporation was down 0.59 percent, contributing to the market’s weak performance.
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Consequently, the year-to-date (YTD) return fell to 26.10 percent, while the market capitalization gained 13.28 billion to close at N35.37 trillion.
Analysis of today’s market activities showed trade turnover settled higher relative to the previous session, with the value of transactions up by 59.99 percent.
A total of 291.71 million shares valued at N7.43 billion were exchanged in 6,213 deals. GTCO (-0.53 percent) led the volume chart with 41.75 million units traded, while AIRTELAFRI (-5.30 percent) led the value chart with deals worth 1.82 billion.
Market breadth closed negative at a 1.39-to-1 ratio, with declining issues outnumbering advancing ones.
NEM (-10.00 percent) topped seventeen (17) others on the laggard’s table, while ETERNA (+10.00 percent) led twelve (12) others on the leader’s log.
(Edited by Oludare Mayowa; omayowa@globalfinancialdigest.com; Newsroom: +234 8033 964 138)
