Business
Conoil, Guinness Nigeria drag market cap down by N663bn

The stock market continued on a negative note on Wednesday, as investors lost N663 billion.
Sell-offs in Conoil, Guiness Nigeria, Consolidated Hallmark Holdings, Royal Exchange and 48 other stocks pulled the market performance down.
Specifically, the market capitalisation, which opened at 90.227 trillion, closed at 89.564 trillion, representing 0.73 per cent.
The All-Share Index also declined by 0.73 per cent or 1,047.16 points to close at 141,566.31, as against 142,613.47 posted on Tuesday.
The market breadth also closed negative with 52 losers and 18 gainers.
On the losing side, Conoil led with a 9.98 per cent decline, ending the session at N211.10 while Guinness Nigeria also dipped by 9.98 per cent, settling at N140.20 per share.
Consolidated Hallmark Holdings fell by 9.94 per cent, finishing at N4.35 and Royal Exchange dropped by 9.92 per cent, closing at N2.27 per share.
Also, FG142027S1 shed by 36.97 per cent, finishing at N75 per share.
Conversely, Austin Laz led the gainers’ table by 10 per cent, closing at N2.64 while Champion Breweries grew by 9.97 per cent, settling at N19.74 per share.
NCR Nigeria soared by 9.77 per cent, finishing at N9.55 and Multiverse Mining and Exploration rose by 8.82 per cent, ending the session at N11.10 per share.
Similarly, Enamelware gained by 8.64 per cent, closing at N39 per share.
An analysis of the market activities revealed a decline in the market volume, value and deals as 721.82 million shares valued at N12.94 billion were traded across 28,745 transactions.
This is in contrast with 1.03 billion shares valued at N17.66 billion that was exchanged across 34,352 transactions earlier on Tuesday.
Meanwhile, Champion Breweries led the activity chart with 54.5 million shares valued at N988.3 million.
Universal Insurance followed with 47.8 million shares worth N57.3 million while Royal Exchange transacted 46.2 million shares valued at N105.2 million.
Regency Alliance Insurance traded 40.8 million shares worth N55.5 million and AIICO Insurance sold 39.3 million shares valued at N156.4 million