The NSE ASI closed at its lowest levels since January 2013, closing 2.8 percent or 827 points lower than the previous day. The NSE ASI ended the day’s trade at 28,961 points, compared with 27,402 in January 2013.
As at the close of the trading day on Wednesday, year-to-date returns on the index had fallen to 27.1 percent.
Brent crude prices rebounded by 3.93 percent or $2.3 to close trading at $62/bn. As a result, global energy stocks rallied. ConocoPhillips shares rose by 6.49 percent; ExxonMobil shares in the NYSE also gained 3.03 percent.
In Nigeria, all sub-indices were down. The oil and gas sub-index declined the worst, bucking the global trend of rallying global energy stock. This perhaps is a sign that Nigeria’s oil Exploration and Production stocks are being hit harder than their global peers. The NSE oil and gas index fell by 4.5 percent. The NSE banking index fell by 4.4 percent, while the consumer goods index declined by 3.6 percent.
Only 10 stocks gained today while 49 stocks declined. The top five gainers include: Betaglass with a 5 percent or N1.26 appreciation in its share price to close trading at N26.46, up from N25.20. E-tranzact also recorded a 5 percent or N0.14 bump in its share price, closing at N2.94, up from N2.80 the previous day.
7-Up gained 4.8 percent or N7.7 to close trading at N166.7 up from N159. Wema bank gained 4.17 percent or N0.04 to close at N1 up from N0.96. Omoluabi Savings and Loans rounded off the top five gainers list to close at N0.76, up from N0.73, gaining 4.11 percent.
Flourmills topped the loser’s chart, losing 9.72 percent or N3.84 to close at N35.65 down from N39.49. PZ Cussons continued to decline, shedding 9.7 or N2.99 percent to close at N27.79 down from N30.78. Presco lost 9.69 percent or N2.48 to close at N23.11 lower than its close of N25.59 the previous day.
Champion breweries lost 9.57 percent or N0.6 to close at N5.67 down from N6.27 on Tuesday, and Dangote Flour shaved 5 percent or N0.23 to close lower at N4.37 from N4.60. other losers after Wednesday’s trade are Dangote sugar, Access bank, Afriprudential, Forte Oil, Ecobank transnational, First Bank, Seplat, Unilever, Zenith bank, UBA, Oando, Stanbic IBTC bank and Total.
The most actively traded stock on Wednesday was Sterling bank, which recorded 442 deals.
In all, 3819 transactions were dealt on the exchange, with a market turnover of N6.2bn.
Source : BusinessDay