EQUITIES
The local bourse sustained its bullish momentum in today’s session, as gains in BUACEMENT (+10.0%), OANDO (+5.7%) and UNILEVER (+7.4%) drove the All-Share Index higher by 0.5% to 144,796.37 points. Accordingly, the Month-to-Date and Year-to-Date returns settled higher at +3.5% and +40.7%, respectively.
The total volume of trades advanced by 26.7% to 1.02 billion units, valued at NGN22.84 billion, and exchanged in 38,932 deals. AIICO was the most traded stock by volume at 97.10 million units, while GTCO was the most traded stock by value at NGN3.93 billion.
Sectoral performance was broadly mixed as the Insurance (+7.5%), Industrial Goods (+3.4%), and Oil & Gas (+0.9%) indices closed higher, while the Banking (-0.9%) and Consumer Goods (-0.4%) indices declined.
As measured by market breadth, market sentiment was positive (2.2x), as 49 tickers lost relative to 22 gainers. AIICO (+10.0%) and MBENEFIT (+10.0%) led the gainers, while LIVINGTRUST (-9.9%) and UPDCREIT (-9.6%) recorded the most significant losses of the day.
CURRENCY
The official FX rate depreciated by 0.9% to NGN1,534.00/USD.
MONEY MARKET & FIXED INCOME
The overnight lending rate expanded by 50bps to 27.0%, in the absence of any significant funding pressure on the system.
The NTB secondary market traded on a calm note with a bullish undertone, as the average yield pared by 1bp to 17.8%. Across the curve, the average yield contracted at the short (-1bp), mid (-1bp) and long (-1bp) segments, driven by the demand for the 80DTM (-1bp), 171DTM (-1bp), and 353DTM (-1bp) bills, respectively. Conversely, the average yield expanded by 6bps to 24.7% in the OMO segment.
Elsewhere, the FGN bond secondary market was bearish, as the average yield expanded by 1bp to 16.3%. Across the benchmark curve, the average yield expanded at the short (+1bp) and mid (+4bps) segments, due to sell pressures on the FEB-2031 (+9bps) and JUN-2033 (+13bps) bonds, respectively, while it remained unchanged at the long end.
