14 equities drop, awaits inflow of N67.7bn matured T-Bills

A total of 14 stocks on the Nigerian Stock Exchange, NSE crashed below the earlier N0.50k threshold price a week after the bourse implemented the price methodology and par value rules.

The bourse saw four equities dropping to 48 kobo per share, the first day the rules took effect, while three others followed the second day.

Although the Insurance sector took a major hit as 10 of its counters dropped below the old price of 50 kobo per share, the sector still closed higher during the week, buoyed by gains on the heavily weighted stocks.

The 14 equities, which closed the week below 50 kobo per share last week, were ABC Transport (40k), African Alliance Insurance (42k), Cornerstone Insurance (47k), FTN Cocoa Processors (46k), and Consolidated Hallmark Insurance (48k).

Others are Japaul Oil & Maritime Services (48k), LASACO Assurance (36k), MBENEFIT (48k), Multiverse Resources (48k), Prestige Assurance (48k), Royal Exchange (42k), Sovereign Trust Insurance (48k), Unic Insurance (46k) and Unity Kapital Assurance (46k).

Meanwhile, market players are anticipating inflows worth N67.68 billion in matured treasury bills this week, as transactions resumed on Monday, February 5.

The N67.68 billion maturing bills this week is lower than N275.21 billion inflow from matured T-bills last week, which moderated the impact of the outflow.

With the expected outflow to fund Dollar purchases this week, and also the possibility of further liquidity mop up by the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, there might be scarcity of funds in the market, which would further increase the cost of funds, Business Post reports

Last week, the apex bank auctioned T-bills worth N252.88 billion viz: 91-day bills worth N6 billion, 182-day bills worth N69.5 billion and N364-day bills worth N177.2 billion.

Their respectively stop rates fell to 12 percent from 12.10 percent, 13.65 percent from 13.75 percent and 13.70 percent from 13.79 percent.

Also, T-Bills worth 275.64 billion were sold via Open Market Operations (OMO). The outflows were partly offset by inflows worth N275.21 billion in matured treasury bills.

Consequently, the Nigerian NIBOR for overnight and 6 months tenor buckets rose to 12.17 percent from 5.92 percent and 16.74 percent from 16.31 percent respectively.

On the other hand, the Nigerian NIBOR for 1 month and 3 months tenor buckets fell w-o-w to 14.39 percent from 14.41 percent.

Elsewhere, NIITY fell for all maturities tracked amid buy pressure: yields on the 1 month, 3 months, 6 months and 12 months maturities increased to 12.40 percent from 14.01 percent, 13.48 percent from 14.80 percent, 14.31 percent from 15.08 percent and 15.45 percent from 15.52 percent respectively.