The Bulls are still dominating in Nigeria’s stock market which has now reached new high with year-to-date (ytd) positive returns of +20.12 percent at the close of trading on Monday, November 9.
With no significant improvement in yields in the fixed income (FI) market, the Nigerian equities market continues to enjoy positive investors’ patronage, as fund managers continue to deploy funds into attractive counters in the equities market.
Investors booked about N640billion in capital appreciation while the benchmark performance indicator –the NSE ASI rose remarkably by 3.96 percent – thanks to stocks like Dangote Cement Plc, MTNN Plc, Lafarge Africa Plc, BUA Cement Plc, GTBank Plc and others that recorded impressive rally in the new trading week. This month, the market has advanced by 5.61 percent.
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“While we imagine the possibility of some profit taking early in the week, we also see the outcome of the US election exciting market participants. Thus, we maintain that the market will continue its bullish streak this week”, Lagos-based United Capital research analysts said in their recent note to investors.
Dangote Cement Plc rallied most, from N174.5 to N185, adding N10.5 or 6.02percent; followed by MTN N Plc which moved from N144 to N150.1, up by N6.1 or 4.24percent. Lafarge Africa Plc increased from N19.5 to N21.45, adding N 1.95 to 10percent; BUA Cement Plc increased from N43 to N44.9, adding N1.9 or 4.42percent; while GTBank Plc advanced from N33.5 to N35.25, up N1.75 or 5.22percent.
“In spite of the rally witnessed in the last few weeks, dividend yields on a number of fundamentally sound stocks remain above short dated instruments in the FI market, as such, we expect the positive performance to continue in the next few sessions, though the possibility of profit taking cannot be overruled”, said Vetiva Research analysts .
The NSE All Share Index and market capitalisation increased from 31,016.17 points and N16.207 trillion to 32,243.05 points and N16.847trillion respectively.
In 7,210 deals, investors exchanged 636,010,098 units valued at N8.244billion. Zenith Bank, FBN Holdings, Access Bank, UBA and Fidelity Bank were actively traded stocks on the Bourse.
