Equities trading at the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) closes negative, on Thursday, to reverse the positive gain it recorded on the first trading day of the second half of the year as investors lose N115.1 billion.

The southward trade was associated with profit-taking and portfolio repositioning in anticipation of second-quarter results.

Thus, the All-Share Index (ASI) lost 1.24 per cent to close at 24,374.40, with investors shedding N159.08 billion from their net worth as market capitalization closed at N12.715 trillion.

Market breadth also closed bearish as seven gainers were recorded against 26 losers on the performance chart.

Specifically, Tier-1 banking stocks such as Zenith Bank, Guaranty Trust Bank, Access Bank and FBN Holdings fell by 5.73, 5.26, 1.52 and 1.92 percentiles respectively as investors booked profit. Hence, the NSE Banking index declined the most by 4.58 per cent.

Similarly, other sub-sector gauges tracked closed southwards, with the NSE Insurance, NSE Consumer Goods, NSE Oil/Gas and NSE Industrial Indices tanked by 1.02, 0.93, 0.30 and 0.02 percentiles respectively.

Activities were however higher on the back of Investors engaging in a sell-frenzy. A total of 180 million shares worth N1.847 billion were traded on Thursday, a 108.14 per cent and 301.17 per cent increase respectively from the previous trading session.

United Bank for Africa, FBN Holdings, Guaranty Trust Bank, Transcorp and Zenith Bank ended the trading day as top performers in terms of volume, while Guaranty Trust Bank, Zenith Bank, Airtel Africa, United Bank for Africa, and FBN Holdings made up the top five performers in terms of the value of units traded.

© Pakistan Press International, source Asianet-Pakistan