- Nigeria’s agric exports rise by 123% – NBS
The cash trading activity on the local exchange showcased a strong bullish trend, with the All-Share Index surging by 0.58 percent to reach 99,793.71 points at the commencement of Monday’s trading session.
Correspondingly, the market capitalization experienced a parallel increase of 0.58 percent, amounting to a substantial gain of N323.31 billion, thereby reaching a total of N56.45 trillion.
This upward momentum was underscored by a predominant bullish sentiment, with 30 advancing stocks outweighing 10 declining ones on the exchange.
Among the top performers for the day were FLOURMILL, TOTAL, ACCESSCORP, CHAMS, and VERITASKAP, each recording significant share price gains of 10.00 percent, 9.98 percent, 9.86 percent, 9.74 percent, and 9.52 percent, respectively.
Market activity witnessed robust participation, with total deals, volume, and value surging by 21.83 percent, 148.33 percent, and 83.55 percent, totaling 8,657 deals, 963.54 million units, and N13.49 billion, respectively.
Across various sectors, the performance remained largely bullish, with notable gains observed in the Banking, Insurance, Consumer Goods, and Oil/Gas indexes, registering increases of 2.71 percent, 0.59 percent, 0.31 percent, and 3.13 percent, respectively.
However, the Industrial Goods index experienced a marginal decline of 0.08 percent. FIDELITY BANK emerged as the most traded security in terms of volume and value, with 605.26 million units valued at N6.03 billion, transacted in 417 trades, closely followed by ACCESSCORP.
The Overnight Nigerian Interbank Offered Rate declined by 28 percentage points to 30.58 percent on Monday, indicating availability of liquidity in the system. Key money market rates such as the Open Repo Rate and Overnight Lending Rate increased, closing at 30.38 percent and 31.09 percent, respectively.
In the Nigerian Interbank Treasury Bills True Yield space, rates declined across tenor maturities. The secondary market for Nigerian Treasury Bills was moderately active and bullish, driven by strong buy sentiment across short, mid, and long tenors, leading to a 0.03 percent drop in the average T-bills yield to 19.91 percent.
In the FGN bond market, trading activity was moderately bearish, leading to an increase in the average yield by 0.02 percent to 18.75 percent. The sovereign Eurobonds market was predominantly bearish across maturities, thus pushing the average yield higher by 9bps to 9.99 percent.
In the foreign exchange market, the Naira appreciated against the dollar by 0.02 percent in the official NAFEM market, closing at ₦1,483.62 per dollar.
At the parallel market, the Naira closed at N1, 465 per dollar.
Nigeria agric exports rise by 123% – NBS
The Nigerian Bureau of Statistics has revealed that agricultural exports from Nigeria to other nations increased by 123 per cent, reaching N463.97 billion compared to the fourth quarter (Q4) of 2023.
Additionally, when compared with the figures from the first quarter (Q1) of 2023, which stood at ₦279.64 billion, NBS data showed a growth of 270%.
The NBS’s report on ‘Foreign Trade in Goods Statistics’ for the first quarter of 2024 noted that most agricultural products valued at ₦572bn were exported to Asia and was followed by exports to Europe at ₦366bn.
According to the reports, Sesamum (benne) seeds valued at ₦247.75 billion tops the exported products, followed by ‘Superior quality Cocoa beans’ at ₦231 billion, and ‘Standard quality Cocoa beans’ at ₦140 billion, while Sesames seeds worth ₦83.29 billion and ₦58.04 billion were exported to China and Japan respectively.
Superior quality Cocoa beans worth ₦112bn and ₦48bn were exported to The Netherlands and Malaysia respectively; whereas ‘Standard quality Cocoa beans’ worth ₦58bn and ₦38bn were exported to both countries.
Meanwhile, total imports of agricultural goods in the first quarter (Q1) of 2024 stood at ₦920bn or 7.28 percent of total imports, connoting an increase of 29.45 percent when compared to the value recorded in Q4, 2023 (₦711bn) and by 95 percent when compared to the value recorded in Q1, 2023 (₦471bn).
The major agricultural goods imported in Q1, 2024 included ‘Durum wheat (not in seeds)’ from Canada with ₦130bn and Lithuania with ₦99bn.
This was followed by Blue whiting (a species of frozen fish) from the Netherlands valued at ₦17bn.
The value of total trade in agricultural goods in the first quarter of 2024 stood at ₦1,95bn, out of which exports were valued at ₦1,035bn.
