Yesterday’s gains was just a dead cat bounce as the equities market retraced its steps from the previous session’s gains to close down by -46bps which was largely owing to NB (-8.33%) and Nestle (-0.88%). Investor appetite remains weak as market breadth closed in the negative zone as notable banking names FBNH (-1.77%), UBA (-1.69%), Access (-1.56%) and Guaranty (-0.70%) finished lower. Excluding notable advancers like WAPCO (+1.39%), Jberger (+3.59%), CCNN (1.70%) and Dangsugar (+1.89%), the gainers chart was dominated by penny stocks.
Market turnover rose to N2.2bn ($6m) and was dominated by offshore crosses in Guaranty ($1.0m), local crosses in Dangcem ($0.42m) and Wapco ($0.16m). Ytd returns on the index closed at -11.53%. We expect the market to maintain its recent trading pattern.