Trading activities across major domestic bourse in Nigeria on Thursday exhibited a bullish trend as both the Nigerian Exchange Limited and the NASD OTC Exchange closed positive.
At the NGX, the market extended the previous day’s bullish sentiments following buying interest in blue chip stocks like MTNN (+2.5%) and WAPCO (+10.0%) alongside 41 other stocks recorded gains as against 14 losers.
Consequently, the benchmark index advanced by 75 basis points (bps) or 0.75% to 106,074.26 points, up from 105,283.67 points on Wednesday.
By implication, the market capitalisation rose to N66.67 trillion as investors gained N508.14 billion, while the Month-to-Date and Year-to-Date returns settled at +0.4% and +3.1%, respectively.
However, the total volume of trade declined by 55.9% to 328.26 million units, valued at N10.37 billion, and exchanged in 12,142 deals. ACCESSCORP was the most traded stock by volume at 48.50 million units, while MTNN was the most traded stock by value at N1.42 billion.
Analysing by sectors, the Insurance (+4.3%), Consumer Goods (+2.4%), Industrial Goods (+1.3%), and Oil & Gas (+0.1%) indices advanced while the Banking (-0.2%) index declined.
As measured by market breadth, market sentiment was positive (3.1x), as 43 tickers gained relative to 14 losers. WAPCO (+10.0%) and IKEJAHOTEL (+10.0%) topped the gainers’ list, while JOHNHOLT (-10.0%) and HMCALL (-10.0%) recorded the highest losses of the day.
NASD OTC Exchange
At the unlisted equities markets, the downturn reported in the previous two sessions in the week was overturned as the NASD OTC Exchange closed on a positive note Thursday.
The NASD Securities Index increased by 0.55% to 3,276.98 points from the 3,259.08 points recorded on Wednesday.
Trading analysis shows the total volume exchanged was 206.15 million units, valued at N354.10 million across 38 deals.
At the close of trading, the NASD OTC recorded three (3) gainers and zero (0) losers.
MONEY MARKET & FIXED INCOME
At the money market, the trend was different as the overnight lending rate contracted by 3bps to 26.9% in the absence of any significant inflows to the system.
But activities in the Treasury bills secondary market were bullish, as the average yield contracted by 19bps to 20.8%.
Across the curve, the average yield expanded at the short (+2bps) end, driven by selloffs of the 91DTM (+16bps) bill, while it contracted at the mid (-9bps) and long (-33bps) segments, following demand for the 168DTM (-49bps) and 196DTM (-176bps) bills, respectively. Meanwhile, the average yield contracted by 95bps to 27.2% in the OMO segment.
The FGN bond secondary market was quiet, albeit with a bullish tilt, as the average yield contracted by 2bps to 18.7%. Across the benchmark curve, the average yield declined at the short (-7bps) end, driven by the demand for the JAN-2026 (-37bps) bond, but was unchanged at the mid and long segments.