BY BAMIDELE FAMOOFO
The local Bourse ASI resumed the week in positive territory as it ballooned by 0.46 percent to close at 49,934.60 points amid sustained bargain-hunting activity even as the Exchange printed more gainers (27) than losers (6) at the close of the trading session.
Consequently, the year-to-date gain of the NGX ASI climbed to 16.90 percent. Specifically, tickers such as CHAMPION, GEREGU, WEMABANK, GTCO, and PRESCO enjoyed investors’ patronage as their respective share prices increased by 10.00 percent, 9.96 percent, 9.94 percent, 3.79 percent, and 3.73 percent.
Of the five indices tracked, three closed in the green zone while others stayed flat; the NGX Banking, NGX Insurance, and NGX Consumer Goods indices rose by 1.38 percent, 1.37 percent, and 1.07 percent, respectively. On the flip side, the NGX Oil/Gas and the NGX Industrial indices remained unchanged from the previous day.
Meanwhile, trading activity was upbeat as the total deals and volume rose by 93.36 percent, and 255.30 percent, respectively, to 3,989 trades and N498.73 million units. In terms of volume. VERITASKAP was the most active stock, with 69.71 million shares worth N348.54 million changing hands in 24 deals.
At the I&E windows, the Naira depreciated further to N461.33 from N456.50 against the US dollar. Conversely, the parallel market rate gained 0.40 percent to N738 from N741.
Global Oil Market As of 3:30 p.m. GMT+1, Brent crude was down by 1.18 percent to $83.34 a barrel. Similarly, WTI crude oil fell 1.38 percent to $78.44 per barrel. Oil futures fell on Monday as traders assessed the impacts of recent COVID-19 case surges in China, the world’s top oil importer.
