By BABAJIDE KOMOLAFE

Retail trading in bonds rose by 34 per cent last week reflecting increasing confidence in the retail bond trading platform introduced last month.

But the total value of shares (equities) listed on the Nigeria Stock Exchange (NSE), or market capitalization, fell by N106 billion to N10.618 trillion last week.

Results of the retail bond trading indicate that the number and value of bonds traded rose by 34 per cent. According to the NSE, “2,536 units of FGN bonds valued at N3.096 million traded during the week in 26 deals in contrast to 1,887 units valued at N2.314 million transacted last week in 20 deals. Likewise, 1,000 units of Lagos State Fixed Rate Redeemable Bond valued at N1, 000,000 was traded in 1 deal. There were no transactions in the Corporate Bonds/Debentures sector.”

Results of the shares traded show the market capitalization declined by 1.0 per cent to N10.512 trillion from N10.618 trillion due to profit taking on the shares Nestle and five other blue companies that led the losers chart.

These top six losers namely Nestle, Guinness, Dangote Cement, Mobil Oil, Total Nigeria Plc and Cadbury PLC accounted for 85 per cent of the total price decline of N77.64 recorded by the top ten losing stocks. The top ten gainers were led by UACN, Oando, Unilever, Glaxo Smithkline , Lafarge Wapco, and Okomu Oil. Together they accounted for 81.9 per cent of the price increase recorded by the top ten gaining stocks.

Trading results indicated decline in activities with less shares traded compared with activities in the previous week. According to the NSE, total number of shares traded fell by 17.4 per cent to 1.928 billion shares from 2.280 billion shares traded the previous week. The value of shares traded similarly dropped by 14.6 per cent  to N20.99 billion from N24.633 billion. The shares traded this week were executed in 28,832 deals, slightly up from 28,170 deals the previous week.

A review of the shares’ price movements indicated that thirty-six (36) equities recorded price increase while forty-four (44) shares recorded price declines and one hundred and seventeen (117) shares remained constant. When compared with the preceding week, thirty-eight (38) shares gained while forty-six (46) shares recorded price declines and one hundred and thirteen (113) shares remained constant.

Reflecting the decline in market activities and value, the NES All Share Index (ASI) depreciated by 334.09 points or 1.01 per cent to close the week at 32,849.11. Also, the Bloomberg NSE 30 Index, which represents the 30 most valuable stocks, depreciated by 12.80 points or 0.81 per cent to close at 1,572.76.

The Financial Services sector accounted for 1.510 billion shares valued at N13.532 billion traded in 17,688 deals. The Banking subsector of the Financial Services sector was the most active during the week (measured by turnover volume); with 1.074 billion shares worth N11.229 billion exchanged by investors in 11,333 deals.