Ngozi Amuche
The equities market recorded major gains of N777.9 billion, even as the naira currency appreciated by N8.00 in the last one week at the parallel market.
All Share Index (ASI) grew by N778 billion to N14.9 trillion as investors saw opportunities in crude oil upbeat and new push to stabilise the global oil market.
However, Brent rebounded to $43.21/barrel from previous week’s close of $40.65/barrel, despite rising COVID-19 cases.
The benchmark stock index, ASI, soared past 13 per cent in the past month, and is also the best-performing market in the world as at last week.
It is currently on the longest winning run since July 2017 as local and foreign investors continue to hunt for higher yields.
Speaking at the last Monetary Policy Committee meeting in Abuja, Central Bank of Nigeria Governor, Godwin Emefiele, said as a lead indicator, the improvement in the equities market indices signposted the commencement of a broad-based economic recovery.
The naira and equities market rebound came after Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and its allies agreed to ensure that proactive and pre-emptive measures are taken to support the global oil market.
OPEC’s 2020 World Oil Outlook showed that the pandemic may prove the tipping point for peak oil demand.
It predicted that global oil demand will grow at relatively healthy rates during the first part of the forecast period before demand plateaus during the second half.
But the external reserves remained pressured as they decreased five basis points week-on-week to $35.7 billion on October 7, data from the Central Bank of Nigeria showed.
At the official window, the CBN spot rate remained unchanged at N379 to a dollar while the parallel market rate strengthened by N8 week-on-week to N457 to a dollar.
Nigerian Autonomous Foreign Exchange (NAFEX) rate depreciated by 83 kobo week-on-week at the Investors and Exporters (I&E) window to close at N385.83 to a dollar.
Report by Afrinvest West Africa said turnover at the I & E window slipped 36.4 per cent week-on-week to $329.2 million, from the $517.5 million recorded in the previous week.