The nation’s bourse extended a negative trend for the third consecutive trading session following sell pressure on Nigerian Breweries, Dangote Sugar Refinery, and tier-1 banks. The All-Share Index on Thursday declined further by 157.39 points or 0.40 per cent to close at 39,394.67 from 39,522.06 posted on Wednesday.

Accordingly, the month-to-date and year-to-date losses increased to 1.1 per cent and 2.3 per cent, respectively. In the same vein, the market capitalization shed N83 billion to close at N20.595 trillion against N20.678 trillion recorded on Wednesday.

The market loss was driven by price depreciation in large and medium capitalised stocks amongst which are; Presco, Nigerian Enamelware, Nigerian Breweries, Julius Berger and Ardova. Consequently, market sentiment was negative with 47 losers in contrast with 13 gainers. Fidson Healthcare led the losers’ chart in percentage terms with 10 per cent to close at N4.41 per share. Northern Nigeria Flour Mills followed with a decline of 9.97 per cent to close at N6.32 per share. NEM Insurance and Nigerian Enamelware shed 9.95 per cent each to close at N1.72 and N19.90 per share, respectively.

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NCR declined by 9.91 per cent to close at N3.09 per share. Conversely, University Press dominated the gainers’ chart in percentage terms with 9.91 per cent to close at N1.22 per share. Morison Industries followed with 9.09 per cent to close at 60k, while Chemical & Allied Products increased by 5.26 per cent to close at N20 per share. Lafarge Africa grew by 3.59 per cent to close at N20.20, while livestock Feeds rose by 3.17 per cent to N2.28 per share. Transactions in the shares of Universal Insurance topped the activity chart with 83.26 million shares valued at N16.65 million.

Zenith Bank followed with 38.65 million shares worth N983.25 million, while FBN Holdings traded 31.25 million shares valued at N216.72 million. United Bank for Africa accounted for 26.78 million shares valued at N211.57 million, while Access Bank transacted 21.59 million shares worth N168.09 million. Meanwhile, the total volume of traded increased by 101.8 per cent as investors bought and sold 493.17 million valued at N4.72 billion exchanged in 5,486 deals. This was against a total of 244.34 million shares worth N4.13 billion traded in 4,714 deals on Wednesday.