Analysts at Bancorp Securities Limited, one of Nigeria’s leading investment research consulting firms, said that they expected cautious trading to continue this week in the equities market pending any significant changes in the both the market and economic indicators/conditions.
The prediction was contained in the firm’s Weekly Stock Recommendations: April 11th – 15th, 2022 sourced by our correspondent.
The company noted that Nigerian equities market closed trading activities for last week on a decline, as investors sell-off sentiment was dominant in three of the five trading days, consequently the NGX All-Share Index and Market
It also recalled that capitalization depreciated by 0.45% to close the week at 46,631.5 points and N25.13 trillion respectively. Likewise, YTD moderated to 9.2% (previously 9.7%).
In similar trend, total value declined by 20.2% to N10.8bn, while total volume was down by 11.8% to 1.14bn units. Trading in the top three equities were Fidelity Bank Plc, Transnational Corporation Of Nigeria Plc, and Zenith Bank Plc accounting for 40.01% of the total equity volume.
Bancorp Securities also noted that profit-taking witnessed in the week was mirrored in the sectorial performance as major indices finished lower except NGX Oil/Gas which was up by 3.14%w/w followed by NGX Banking index with 1.51% gain on the back of buying interest in CONOIL, ARDOVA, WEMA BANK and GTCO.
It further reported that Insurance, Consumer Goods and Industrial indices were down by 0.21%, 0.35% and 0.42% w/w respectively on the back of price decline in CORNERSTONE, WAPIC, NASCON and LAFARGE AFRICA.
The firm’s analysts recommended GTCO, WAPCO, ZENITH, FLOURMILL as ‘Strong Buy’ for investors based on the recent performances of the companies, especially in year-on-year gross earnings and revenues, amongst other assessment indices.
For instance, the firm’s experts projected on GTCO: “In 2022, we estimate the group’s earnings to rebound, aided by higher treasury yields and risk asset development.
“Furthermore, the company is trading at a significant discount and historical valuation after losing 19.6% in 2021. Investors will find this to be an appealing starting point. As a result, we retain our BUY rating on the stock”, they added.
