Manufacturing and oil companies boosted market performance on Tuesday as the market capitalisation of equities listed on the Nigerian Stock Exchange increased by N43.82bn.
The market capitalisation, which stood at N11.176 on Monday, increased to N11.220tn at the end of trading on the floor of the Exchange on Tuesday.
The All Share Index increased by 0.34 per cent to settle at 30,718.72 basis points, thereby improving the year-to-date loss to -19.7 per cent.
Analysts at Afrinvest Securities Limited said the market performance was slightly bullish as some of the losses from previous trading sessions were recouped.
They said the positive performance was on the back of modest gains in Dangote Cement Plc, Dangote Sugar Refinery Plc and United Bank for Africa Plc.
Activity level, however, strengthened as value and volume traded increased by 104 per cent and 30.9 per cent to N3.398bn and 215.380 million units, respectively.
The top traded stocks by value were Zenith Bank Plc (N1.346bn), Nestlé Nigeria Plc (N640.156m) and Dangote Cement (N287.257m), while Zenith Bank (58.298 million units), Sterling Bank Plc (35.125 million units) and FBN Holdings Plc (25.558 million units) were the top traded stocks by volume.
Performance across sectors was mixed as three sectors closed in the green.
The Industrial Goods index recorded a rebound from Monday’s negative performance as it has the highest percentage of increase, advancing by 0.66 per cent on the back of gains in Dangote Cement and Lafarge Africa Plc.
The Consumer Goods index trailed, advancing by 0.58 per cent as a result of price appreciations in Dangote Sugar, Nigerian Breweries Plc and Flour Mills Nigeria Plc.
The Oil & Gas index gained a marginal 0.10 per cent due to the gains recorded in Forte Oil Plc.
On the flip side, the Banking index continued in its bearish performance as it declined by 0.09 per cent due to losses in Guaranty Trust Bank Plc and Diamond Bank Plc.
Similarly, the Insurance index depreciated by 0.35 per cent as NEM Insurance Plc and Prestige Assurance Plc recorded losses that weighed on the indices.
Twenty-three gainers emerged against 16 losers at the end of trading on Tuesday, while the market breadth improved to 1.4x as investor sentiment improved by 133.33 per cent.