Nigeria’s market failed to record positive investors’ patronage on Tuesday July 21 despite cheap valuations of a number of fundamentally justified stocks.
The market’s negative close was driven by stocks like Dangote Cement Plc which led the laggards after its share price moved from N126 to N122, losing N4 or 3.17percent.
The stock market decreased further by about N50billion or 0.39percent at the close of trading session. Only this week it has dipped by 0.47percent; this month it has lost 1.24 percent of its value while this year its negative return increased to 9.94percent.
Other companies that made top losers’ list include CAP Plc which decreased from N20.65 to N18.95 after shedding N1.7 or 8.23 percent.
International Breweries Plc was also down from N3.8 to N3.45, losing 35kobo or 9.21percent. Eterna Plc dropped from N2 to N1.8, losing 20kobo or 10percent while Zenith Bank Plc share price moved from day open high of N15.65 to N15.55, losing 10kobo or 0.64percent.
“We expect investors to take advantage of bargain hunting opportunities in fundamentally strong names and hold for the long term. Investors could gravitate towards stocks with track records of high profitability, low financial leverage, and less margin volatility amidst the current macro vulnerabilities”, said CardinalStone research analysts in their July 21 note.
The Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) All Share Index (ASI) decreased to 24,174.45 points on Tuesday July 21 while the value of listed stocks decreased to N12.610trillion as against preceding trading day high 24,269.58 points and N12.660trillion respectively.
In 3,500 deals investors exchanged 304,185,443 units valued at N3.268billion.
