BY BAMIDELE FAMOOFO
Ending the perfect week, Nigerian equities closed the session stronger on Friday, bringing the All-Share index up by 2.04 percent to settle at 47,554.34 points, the highest point since 14 October.
Telco heavyweights, AIRTELAFRI (+7.41%) and MTNN (+5.00%) were the primary drivers of the market’s strong close. Notably, having gained in all five (5) trading sessions this week, the ASI closed 6.88 percent higher w/w, the largest weekly gain since 18 December 2020.
Over the course of the week, strong bullish sentiment in index heavyweights, AIRTELAFRI (+14.17 w/w), DANGCEM (+9.98% w/w) and MTNN (+6.60% w/w) offset losses in NESTLE (-20.67% w/w), SEPLAT (-3.57% w/w) and PRESCO (-8.71% w/w). As a result, the year-to-date (YTD) return rose to 11.33 percent, while the market capitalization gained N1.67tn w/w to close at N25.90tn.
Analysis of today’s market activities showed trade turnover settled higher relative to the previous session, with the value of transactions up by 154.41 percent. A total of 98.98m shares valued at N5.52bn were exchanged in 2,780 deals. FCMB (-0.91%) led the volume chart with 16.84m units traded while MTNN (+5.00%) led the value chart in deals worth N3.30bn.
Market breadth closed positive at a 2.29-to-1 ratio with advancing issues outnumbering declining ones. REGALINS (+8.70%) topped fifteen (15) others on the gainer’s table while NESTLE (-10.00%) led six (6) others on the laggard’s log.
