(Greenwich Merchant Bank): The impact of the rise in interest rate persisted in local bourse as the NGX-ASI and Market Capitalisation recorded another loss of 0.27% to settle at 51,979.92 points and NGN28,030.67 million respectively.
The decline witnessed today could be attributed to losses in the share price of ZENITHBANK (5.48%), FLOURMILL (2.94%), UBA (0.68%) and GTCO (0.48%). Thus bringing the Year-to-Date to 21.69%.
However, market sentiment were bullish as both volume and value traded increase by 34.96% (205.06 million units) and 41.78% (NGN3,058 million) respectively. UBA was the equity with highest volume traded while GTCO posted the highest market turnover for the second day in a row.
Market breadth was negative at 0.5x; owing to nine (9) gainers and eighteen (18) losers.
Sector performance was mixed as the Banking sector (2.75%), Oil & Gas sector (0.12%) and Industrial sector (0.54%) recorded losses while Consumer Goods sector (1.31%) and Insurance sector (0.22%) closed in profit.
Fixed Income Market
Yields continued its upward trend in the Bond market, leading to a n increase in average yield by 12bps. This was majorly due to the 1.88% increase in the 14-Mar-24 instrument. Therefore, average yield closed at.12.20% from 12.07%.
Nigeria’s Treasury bills and OMO market remained still, as yields closed flat across the yield curve. This led to average yield retaining its previous day figure and closing the week at 7.23% and 9.05% respectively.
System liquidity was estimated at a negative balance of NGN63.22 billion, from a negative balance of NGN188.63 billion. The Open Buy Back increased from 14.75% to end the day at 14.83% while the Overnight maintained its previous close of 15.0% for the third day in a row.
Depreciation of the Naira persisted at the Investors’ and Exporters’ Window (I&EW) to close at NGN430.00/USD from NGN426.00/USD yesterday
Ifunanya Ikueze is an Engineer, Safety Professional, Writer, Investor, Entrepreneur and Educator.
