Bancorp Securities Limited’s experts have projected a slight reduction in negative sentiment in the nation’s equities market this week as investors would hand-pick relatively attractive stocks
The firm’s position on the trading trend this week at the equities market is contained in its ‘Weekly Stock Recommendations: Jun 27th – Jul 1st, 2022’ published on Monday.
The analysts projected: “We expect negative sentiment to dwindle in the domestic market this week as investors hand-pick relatively attractive stocks.”
The researchers recommended five stocks, namely GTCO, ZENITH, UBA, WAPCO and MTNN as strong buy to investors this week.
For instance, based on the recent strong performance of GTCO in recent months as reflected in its financial statements and other assessment criteria, the analysts anticipated “that the acquisition of non-bank companies will boost shareholder value by exploiting cross-selling opportunities in its banking sector, and we anticipate that half-year results will reflect this.
On ZENITH stock as strong buy, the researchers hinged their recommendations on the lender’s recently released Q1’22 performance which indicated operating performance resiliency and they expected the loan growth to boost interest revenue while non-interest income remains stable.
This is even as they projected that based on Lafarge Africa Plc’s (WAPCO’s) improved performance in its Q1 2022 financial results and other operational strong indices, they expected “the growth momentum to persist into the subsequent quarters of 2022, driven by sustained product demand. We also expect sustained cost optimization to drive bottom line growth.”
The experts recalled that trading activities on the Nigerian equities market closed in red w/w last Friday as sustained cautious trading drove the NGX All-Share Index down 0.14% w/w to close at 51,705.61 points.
The firm noted that “accordingly, YTD return declined to 21.0% while market capitalization shed N3.62bn w/w to N138.3tn. In the same vein, activity level waned as volume and value traded fell 7.7% and 3.0% w/w respectively to 1.12bn units and N13.7bn.
“Trading in the top three equities were FCMB Group Plc, United Bank for Africa Plc and Oando Plc accounted contributing 36.39% and 14.66% to the total equity volume and value respectively, while PRESCO (N1.5bn), MTNN (N1.4bn), and GTCO (N1.1bn) led by value. Performance was mixed across sectors within our coverage as 3 indices gained and 3 lost.
“The Banking and Oil & Gas indices advanced by 0.3% w/w apiece on the back of price uptick in ZENITH, FIDELITY, and ARDOVA. On the flip side, the Consumer Goods index lost the most, down 2.0% w/w on selloffs in NNFM and FLOURMILL.
“Similarly, losses in MEYER, BUACEMENT, SOVRENINS, and LINKASSURE drove the Industrial Goods and Insurance indices lower by 1.9% and 1.4% w/w respectively”, it added.
