Naira, stocks appreciate

Money in distributable pool falls

The Naira on Monday appreciated by 4.4 per cent against the dollar at the parallel market, gaining N16 from its Friday rate.

The nation’s currency exchanged at N345 to a dollar from N361 it traded on Friday.

However, the currency exchanged at N385 and N380 to Pounds Sterling and the Euro, respectively, at the Monday’s trading.

The official Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) rate remained at N197 to the dollar.

Traders told NAN that the money market had started recovering from the shock of Wednesday’s increase in the pump price of petrol from N86.50 per litre to N145 per litre, which saw a “free fall’’ of the naira at the market.

Similarly, activities on the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) were upbeat on Monday, with market capitalisation improving by N130 billion following price appreciation by some highly capitalised stocks.

The market capitalisation which opened at N9.098 trillion rose by N130 billion or 1.43 per cent to close at N9.228 trillion.

Also, the All-Share Index appreciated by 377.74 points or 1.43 per cent to close at 26,818.77 points against 26,441.03 on Friday.

Nigerian Breweries led the gainers’ table with a gain of N5.05 to close at N123 per share.

Total garnered N5 to close at N175, while Guinness increased by N4.75 to close at N99.75 per share.

Lafarge Africa gained N2.80 to close at N74 and Dangote cement grew by N2.10 to close at N167.10 per share.

On the other hand, MRS Oil recorded the highest loss to lead the losers’ table, decreasing N3.94 to close at N36.53 per share.

UNILEVER came second with a loss of N1.65 to close at N34.35, while G Cappa lost 72k to close at N13.74 per share.

VITAFOAM shed 52k to close at N4.90 and ETI dropped 50k to close at N14.56 per share.

Access Bank was the toast of investors’ in terms of volume of shares traded, accounting for N48.61 million shares valued at N240.87 billion.

UBA trailed with an exchange of 40.98 million shares worth N155.95 million and Transcorp sold 34.76 million shares valued at N44.79 million.

Fidelity Bank traded 29.83 million shares worth N38.59 million and FBN Holdings exchanged 23.73 million shares valued at N87.04 million.

In all, a total of 320.99 million shares worth N2.11 billion was traded by investors in 4,524 deals, compared with 567.59 million shares valued
at N3.58 billion which exchanged hands in 5,523 deals on Friday.