EQUITIES
The Nigerian equities market commenced the week on a bearish note, as losses in WAPCO (-3.0%), GTCO (-1.5%) and ZENITHBANK (-1.8%) drove the All-Share Index lower by 1bp to 119,978.57 points. Accordingly, the Month-to-Date and Year-to-Date returns settled at +7.4% and +16.6%, respectively.
The total volume of trades increased by 224.7% to 2.03 billion units, valued at NGN44.34 billion, and exchanged in 25,172 deals. ROYALEX was the most traded stock by volume at 502.26 million units, while OANDO was the most traded stock by value at NGN19.87 billion.
Sectoral performance was mixed as the Banking (-1.1%), Industrial Goods (-0.4%) and Oil & Gas (-0.3%) indices closed lower, while the Consumer Goods (+0.8%) and Insurance (+0.7%) indices advanced.
As measured by market breadth, market sentiment was mixed (1.0x), as 31 tickers gained relative to 30 losers. LEARNAFRCA (-10.0%) and JBERGER (-10.0%) recorded the most significant losses of the day while CWG (+10.0%) and CAVERTON (+10.0%) led the gainers.
CURRENCY
The official FX rate appreciated by 1.0% to NGN1,526/USD.
MONEY MARKET & FIXED INCOME
The overnight lending rate expanded by 17bps to 27.2% in the absence of any significant funding pressures on the system.
Proceedings in the Treasury bill secondary market were bullish, as the average yield contracted by 3bps to 20.2%. Across the curve, the average yield contracted at the short (-2bps), mid (-4bps) and long (-2bps) segments, driven by the demand for the 80DTM (-3bps), 143DTM (-10bps) and 339DTM (-22bps) bills, respectively. Similarly, the average yield contracted by 6bps to 26.4% in the OMO segment.
Activities in the FGN bond secondary market were quiet as the average yield remained unchanged at 18.1%.
Across the benchmark curve, the average yield expanded at the short (+2bps) and mid (+3bps) segments due to the sell-off on the JUL-2030 (+10bps) and FEB-2031 (+14bps) bonds, respectively, but contracted at the long (-4bps) end following the demand for the.JUL-2045 (-25bps) bond.
