EQUITIES
The bears continued to dominate the local bourse, with the NGX ASI closing lower for the third consecutive trading session. Today’s performance was driven by losses in ARADEL (-7.9%), BUACEMENT (-2.8%), DANGCEM (-0.8%), and BETAGLAS (-10.0%), which dragged the All-Share index 0.7% lower to 154,260.98 points. Consequently, the Month-to-Date and Year-to-Date returns moderated to +8.1% and +49.9%, respectively.
The total volume traded declined by 13.8% to 452.9 million units, valued at NGN14.84 billion and exchanged in 27,654 deals. TANTALIZER was the most traded stock by volume at 56.73 million units, while GTCO was the most traded stock by value at NGN3.08 billion.
Sectoral performance was broadly negative as the Oil & Gas (-3.7%), Insurance (-2.5%), Industrial Goods (-1.6%), Banking (-0.4%) and Consumer Goods (-0.2%) indices declined.
As measured by market breadth, market sentiment was negative (0.4x), as 45 tickers lost relative to 20 gainers. BETAGLAS (-10.0%) and JOHNHOLT (-10.0%) led the laggards, while DEAPCAP (+9.7%) and ASOSAVINGS (+8.9%) posted the most significant gains of the day.
CURRENCY
The official FX rate appreciated by 0.4% to NGN1,445.00/USD.
MONEY MARKET & FIXED INCOME
The overnight lending rate contracted by 2bps to 24.8% despite NGN313.77 billion in debits for the FGN bond PMA conducted on Monday.
The NTB secondary market traded on a calm note, as the average yield remained unchanged at 17.4%. Across the curve, the average yield contracted at the short (-1bp) and mid (-1bp) segments, driven by the demand for the 85DTM (-1bp) and 176DTM (-1bp) bills, respectively, while it closed flat at the long end. Conversely, the average yield expanded by 10bps to 22.0% in the OMO segment.
The FGN bond secondary market traded on a bearish note, as the average yield expanded by 3bps to 15.8%. Across the benchmark curve, the average yield expanded at the short (+7bps) end, due to profit-taking in the APR-2029 (+39bps) bond, but was unchanged at the mid and long segments.
