The stock market halted the long run of successive gains as the All-Share Index fell 22bps to close at 25,166.01 points due to profit taking in UBA (-6.3 percent ), Zenith (-2.5 percent ) and Guarantee Trust Bank (-1.8 percent).
Consequently, investors lost N28.8bn as market capitalisation settled at N13.1tn while year to date loss worsened to -6.2 percent.
Activity level weakened as volume and value traded declined 40.1 percent and 38.6 percent to 348.2m units and N3.4bn respectively.
The most active stocks by volume were FBNH (47.4m units) Access (36.9m units), and Zenith (27.4m units) while GTB (N576.2m), Zenith (N478.1m) and MTNN (N474.3m) led by value.
Performance across all sectors under review was mixed as 3 indicators lost against the 3 that gained.
The Banking index (-2.8 percent) led the losers as investors took profit in UBA (-6.3 percent), Zenith (-2.5 percent ) and GTB (-1.8 percent ).
Likewise, the Oil & Gas (-0.6 percent) and Consumer Goods (-0.1 percent) indices lost due to sell-offs in Oando(-5.7 percent ) and Flour Mill (-4.8 percent ).
Conversely, the Insurance (+1.2 percent) index recorded the most gain on the back of buying interest in Cornerstone (+7.7 percent ) and Mansard (+8.2 percent ).
Similarly, price appreciation in MTNN (+0.9 percent ) and Dangote cement(+0.9 percent ) saw the AFR-ICT and Industrial Goods indices close higher by 0.5 percent and 0.2 percent respectively.
Investor sentiment as measured by market breadth fell to 1.0x from the 2.8x recorded in the previous session as 18 stocks gained while 18 lost.
The top gainers were CUTIX (+9.9 percent ), May and Baker (+9.7 percent ) and Champion (+9.6 percent ) while ETI (-9.9 percent ), Ikeja Hotel (-8.7 percent ) and UBA (-6.2 percent ) led the losers.
Meanwhile Cornerstone Insurance Plc filled its Full Year 2019 Audited Financial Statements to the exchange which indicates that Gross premium written rose 12.9% y/y to N13.1bn while Profit after tax grew 36.2% y/y to N4.1bn.
