Equities trading on the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) closed today on negative note, as the benchmark indices depreciated by 1.08 percent with the total stock value declining by N153 billion.

The All-Share Index (ASI) lost 422.1 absolute points to close at 38, 606.41 basis points as against 0.75 percent depreciation recorded previously. The market capitalization dipped 1.08 percent to close at N13.984 trillion. Its Year-to-Date (YTD) returns currently stands at +0.95 percent.

The bearish run was occasioned by losses recorded by some highly capitalized stocks such as Nestle, Nigerian Breweries, International Breweries, Dangote Cement and WAPCO.

However, Nestle led on the losers table with its share price dropping by N60 or 3.75 percent to close at N1,540 per share. The food and beverage company was followed by Nigerian Breweries with N5 or 4.35 percent to close at N110 per share.

International Breweries crashed N2.55 or 4.94 percent to close at N49.25 per share, Dangote Cement lost N2.5 or 1.02 percent to close at N242.5 per share.

WAPCO was down N1.09 or 4.94 percent to close at N36.6 per share.

Despite the loss streak, Flour Mills topped the gainers’ chart, gaining N1.5 or 4.98 percent to close at N31.6 per share. Dangote Sugar gained 45 kobo to close at N17 per share while Dangote Flour recorded four kobo gain or 4.68 percent to close at N8.95 per share. FBN Holdings and Fidson added 35 kobo and 29 kobo to close at N9.6 and N6.27 respectively.

Market turnover closed positive as volume moved up by 53.86 percent as against 24.89 percent downtick recorded in the previous session.

In all, a volume of 342.46 million shares valued at N4.739 billion were traded in 5,057 deals.