The equities market today dropped marginally by 0.26 percent, as domestic and international criticism continues to trail the suspension of the Chief Justice of Nigeria, Walter Onnoghen, by President Muhammadu Buhari last Friday.
While analysts have expressed concerns over possible effects of the suspension on the economy and the equities market in particular, they however attributed today’s performance to factors not exclusive to the on-going developments around the Onnoghen case.
‘’The market has gained consecutively in the last two weeks and before the CJN’s suspension, so I anticipated profit taking activities would follow this week’’ Paul Aluko, analyst at MBC Capital Limited, told BusinessDay over the phone. He explained that the CJN’s case was still of much concern to investors especially with the elections around the corner.
The market capitalisation closed at N11.69trn, from N11.719trn where it ended last Friday, according to figures from the Nigerian Stock Exchange.
Gbolahan Ologunro, an equity research analyst at CSL stockbrokers, explained that intra-day trading oscillated between gains and losses, which supported the market ahead of full-year results and dividend declaration, otherwise the market could have gone more bearish than what was seen.
“The market lost mildly contrary to analysts’ expectation of the CJN news triggering a major selloff, although it remained highly volatile during the day,” Ologunro said.
Market was swayed by profit-taking in banking stocks especially, which gained significantly in previous week’s trading.
Depreciations recorded in the share prices of FBN Holdings, Access Bank, Seplat, GT Bank and UBA were mainly responsible for the loss recorded in the Index.
Shares of UBA fell (-4.55 percent), Seplat (-3.70 percent), Guaranty Trust Bank (-0.72 percent), Access Bank (-2.31 percent) and Fidelity Bank (-5.60 percent), exerting the most pressure on the All Share Index. These were enough to offset gains in Zenith, Oando and Total, among others.
Across sectors, the market was bearish as only one out of five sectors covered closed in the green.
The industrial goods sector gained 0.01 percent, as opposed to losses in banking (-0.50 percent), oil and gas (0.4 percent), consumer goods (-0.17 percent), and insurance sector which lost the most for the day (-1.14 percent)
President Muhammadu Buhari, Friday, suspended the Chief Justice of Nigeria, Walter Onnoghen, after the presidency said it received an ex parte order from the Code of Conduct Tribunal (CCT) giving it the go-ahead for the replacement of the CJN on issues bordering on false declaration of assets and traces of suspicious transactions running into millions of dollars to the CJN’s personal accounts.
The President also swore in Tanko Mohammed as Acting Chief Justice.
The move by the Nigerian president has raised criticism from both domestic and international communities with the US, UK and the EU independently releasing statements telling the presidency to follow constitutional procedures in handling the situation, especially given the fact that the 2019 elections are only three weeks away.
The presidency, however, responded with a warning to the international community to stop “meddling with the country’s affairs”.
MICHEAL ANI & SEGUN ADAMS
