Nigeria stock market loses N265bn on banks’ unimpressive Q3 results

The Nigerian Stock Exchange market indicators on Friday dropped further by 1.46 per cent due to unimpressive third quarter results released by some banks.

The All-Share Index lost 506.83 points or 1.46 per cent to close at 34,136.82 compared with 34,643.65 recorded on Thursday.

Also, the market capitalisation dipped N265 billion or 1.46 per cent to close at N17.837 trillion against N18.102 trillion achieved on Thursday.

Mr Ambrose Omordion, the Chief Operating Officer, InvestData Ltd., attributed the emergence of the bears to third quarter below expectation results released by some banks.

Omordion said that the development triggered profit taking in spite of positive economic news of an expansion in the nation’s industrial output as shown by the Purchasing Managers Index.

BUA Cement topped the losers’ chart with a loss of N2.55 to close at N53.45.

MTN Nigeria Communications trailed with N2 to close at N153, while Dangote Cement dipped N1.80 to close at N193 per share.

Dangote Sugar lost 70k to close at N20.50 per share.

On the other hand, UPDC Reits led the gainers’ table, gaining 35k to close at N4.15 per share.

NEM Insurance followed with 23k to close at N2.58, while NAHCO garnered 12k to close at N2.30 per share.

Ikeja Hotel added 10k to close at N1.10, while AIICO gained 9k to close at N1.01 per share.

An analysis of the activity chart shows that Zenith Bank was the most active stock, trading 44.33 million shares valued at N1.14 billion.

United Bank for Africa accounted for 41.23 million shares worth N337.79 million, FBN Holdings traded 34.33 million shares valued at N255.34 million.

Access Bank traded 29.29 million shares worth N256.27 million, while Transcorp exchanged 28.77 million shares valued at N29.14 million.

In all, investors bought and sold 344.90 million shares valued at N4.22 billion in 6,565 deals.

This was against a total of 364.92 million shares worth N3.50 billion exchanged in 6,340 deals on Thursday.