By Taiye Olayemi

Stock market investors traded 4.847 billion shares worth N149.755 billion in 174,267 transactions on the floor of the Exchange during the week ended.

This is in contrast to 3.691 billion shares valued at N112.261 billion that exchanged hands last week in 138,250 transactions.

Consequently, the value of transactions traded by investors on the Exchange rose by 25.04 per cent.

The Financial Services industry led the activity chart with 3.314 billion shares valued at N61.084 billion traded in 70,239 transactions.

This contributed 68.37 per cent and 40.79 per cent to the total equity turnover volume and value respectively.

The Consumer Goods Industry followed with 326.455 million shares worth N19.777 billion in 23,764 deals.

The third place was the Services Industry, with a turnover of 279.737 million shares worth N3.947 billion in 12,794 transactions.

Trading in the top three equities, namely FCMB Group Plc, Fidelity Bank Plc and Universal Insurance Plc, accounted for 1.245 billion shares worth N15.825

billion in 9,250 deals.

This contributed 25.69 per cent and 10.57 per cent to the total equity turnover volume and value respectively.

The NGX All-Share Index and Market Capitalisation appreciated by 5.07 per cent and 5.08 per cent to close the week at 141,263.05 and N89.373 trillion respectively.

Similarly, all other indices finished higher with the exception of NGX Insurance and NGX Oil and Gas which depreciated by 1.22 per cent and 0.48 per cent respectively, while the NGX ASeM Index closed flat.

Fifty-four equities appreciated in price during the week, lower than 60 equities in the previous week.

Forty-nine equities depreciated in price, higher than 43 in the previous week, while 43 equities remained unchanged, lower than 44 recorded in the previous week.

UAC of Nigeria, Mecure Industries, Custodian Investment, Veritas Kapital Assurance and Tripple Gee and Company were the top five gainers for the week, as they grew in 60.69 per cent, 41.52 per cent, 27.87 per cent, 23.01 per cent and 22.51 per cent respectively.

The companies gained N33.35, N4.65, N8.50, 26k and 79k respectively.

The top five decliners for the week were: Abbey Mortgage Bank, FTN Cocoa Processors, Cornerstone Insurance, Nigerian Aviation Handling Company and The Initiates, as they lost N2.73, N1.47, 79k, N17.70 and N2.38 respectively.

The NGX also hinted that additional 11.5 million ordinary shares by Seplat Energy was listed on its Daily Official List on Friday, Aug. 1.

The additional shares listed on NGX arose from the company’s Employee Share-Based Payment.

With this listing of the additional 11.5 million ordinary shares, the total issued, and fully paid-up shares of Seplat Energy Plc has now increased from 588,444,561 to 599,944,561 ordinary shares.  (NAN)(www.nannews.ng)

Edited by Olawunmi Ashafa