BY BAMIDELE FAMOOFO
At the end of Thursday’s trade, the domestic bourse closed positive as the All-Share Index rose by 0.29 percent to 55,670.24 points. Consequently, the year-to-date gain of the NGX ASI climbed to 8.62 percent despite the exchange printing a higher number of losers (25) than gainers (17).
Notably, the performance of DANGSUGAR (+9.94%) and NASCON (+8.93%) was positive, as investors responded positively to their strong corporate results and dividend announcements, while ACCESSCORP (-3.13%) saw price depreciation as investors reacted negatively to delays in its earnings reports.
Sectorial performance was negative as three of the five sub-sector indices tracked closed in the red territory: the NGX Banking, NGX Insurance, and NGX Oil/Gas indices, declined by 1.11 percent, 0.09 percent, and 0.25 percent, respectively. On the flip side, the NGX Consumer Goods index rose by 0.58, while the NGX Industrial index remained unchanged from Wednesday.
In the broader market, the NGX Premium rose by 17 basis points while the NGX-30 index decreased by 3 basis points.
Meanwhile, trading activity decreased, with total volume and value falling by 63.57 percent and 50.45 percent, respectively, to 206.11 million units, and N3.26 billion. In terms of volume, TRANSCORP was the most active stock, with 29.75 million shares worth N39.15 million changing hands in 174 deals.
