BY NKIRUKA NNOROM

The shares of the following ten companies recorded the highest gains last week. These are PZ Cusson Nigeria Plc, UACN Plc, Forte Oil Plc, Cement Company of Northern Nigeria Plc (CCNN), BOC Gas Plc, A.G Leventis Plc, UBA Plc, Neimeth International Pharmaceuticals Plc and Glaxosmithkline Nigeria Plc.

PZ Cusson topped the gainers with price gain of N6.50 per share at the end of trading session last week. The home care manufacturing company opened the week at N35.50 per share and closed at N42.00 per share.

As at the close of transactions on Friday 19th April, 2013, a total of 569,418 shares were transacted in the company. Already, the share price has risen by N23.46 or 52.74 per cent from year low of N21.02 to year high of N44.48. PZ Cusson manufactures highly demanded home care, personal care and baby care products.

With N2.10, UACN came second on the gainers table within the week to close the market at N57.01 per share. A total of 60,014 shares were traded in the company. It started the year at N28.00 per share before rising to the present market price.

At the close of trading last week, investors bought 707,600 units of the company’s share valued at N40.09 million. UACN has made some strategic acquisitions, including the acquisition of 51 percent equity stake in Livestock Feeds. The company also sealed a joint venture deal with South African conglomerate – Tiger Brands, where Tiger will hold 49 percent equity stake, while UACN holds the remaining 51 percent.

Forte Oil gained N1.41 to close as the third top gainer for week. It closed the week at N15.55 per share after investors bought 873,362 shares worth N13.39 million in the company. Forte Oil operates in the downstream petroleum oil and gas industry, and had recently returned to profitability after posting losses for about three consecutive years. Its profit after tax for 2012 rose to N1.007 billion, from a loss after tax of N19.54billion in 2011, representing an increase of 105 percent.

CCNN followed with gain of N1.16 to close at N10.50 per share. Total of 672,937 units valued at N6.621 million were traded during the week. The company had recently indicated interest to double its capacity to 600,000 tonnes per annum.

BOC Gas, another downstream oil marketing company garnered N0.50 to close the week at N8.50 per share. Investors bought 415,509 units of the shares at N3.34 million.

The last five top gainers include, A.G Leventis which chalked up N0.47.  UBA Plc, which is adjudged the best performing Nigeria lender year-to-date in Bloomberg Industries African Banks Index, added N0.40 to close the week at N7.00 per share. UBA has risen by 57 percent in 2013, compared with an average increase of four percent for banks in the country, according to data obtained from Bloomberg index.

Neimeth, Unilever Plc and Glaxosmithkline were the last three on the top tem gainers chart,  appreciating by N0.22, N0.21 and N0.20 respectively.