Investors, on Wednesday, cherry-picked Seplat (+10.0percent), BUA cement (+1.0percent) and FBNH (+1.0percent), with All-Share Index (ASI) rising to 18 basis points (bps) to settle at 24,693.73 points at the stock market.
With this, the investors gained ₦22.7 billion as market capitalisation rose to ₦12.9 trillion while year to date loss eased to -8.0 percent.
Activity level waned with trade volume and value declined 32.4 percent and 50.8 percent to 101.6m units and ₦973.6 million respectively.
The top traded stocks by volume were Guaranty Trust bank (10.9m units), FBNH (9.7m units) and UBA (9.4m units) while GTB (₦244.7m), SEPLAT (₦166.7m) and Zenith (₦83.9m) led by value.
On the part of Corporate Actions, Union Bank released its unaudited Q2:2020 result showing gross earnings falling by 1.0percent to ₦37.9bn from ₦38.3bn in Q2:2019 while profit after tax declined 27.9percent to ₦4.7bn from ₦6.6bn.
Unity Bank also declared gross earnings of N22.8bn in six months of 2020, sustaining its win in the 2019 financials when it posted N44.59bn.
The half-year gross earnings rose 11 percent to N22.87bn from N20.55bn in 2019. Its Profit Before Tax (PBT) grew by 7 percent from N1.05bn in half-year 2019 to N1.12bn during the period. Its Profit After Tax (PAT) rose by 7 percent to N1.03bn from N967.51m in 2019. Its Managing Director/CEO, Tomi Somefun, said: “The assessment, therefore, is that the repositioning efforts which have taken root before the headwinds are equally able to withstand shocks.”
Union Bank also released its result revealing sustained PBT of ₦11.3bn (₦11.2bn in H1 2019) while gross earnings reached 10 percent to ₦79.9bn (₦72.4bn in H1 2019), driven by an increase in earning assets.
The CEO, Emeka Emuwa, said: “Notwithstanding the significant headwinds, the bank delivered a 10 percent increase in its top line revenue of ₦79.9bn for H1 2020. In addition, net interest income before impairments is up 21percent to N28.0bn and non-interest income up 22percent to ₦22.7bn.
