The domestic equities market on Wednesday returned to negative performance, declining by N444 billion as losses recorded by heavyweight stocks dragged the trading downward.

Market capitalization of listed equities depreciated by 0.49 per cent to N90.996 trillion from N91.440 trillion reported the previous day.

The NGX All Share Index also declined by 698.56 basis points to 143064.57 points from 143763.13 points reported on Tuesday.

The negative performance was driven by drop in the shares of Cadbury Nigeria Plc, BuaCement, Honey Well Flour, Nigerian Breweries, Wapco Meyer Paint and others.

Although the market breath was positive with 29 advancers against 27 decliners, losses in the strong fundamentals stocks pull the market back, bringing year to date return to 39.00 per cent.

Volume of trades up by 182,199 million, representing 32.76 per cent as investors traded 738.352 million shares against 556.153 million reported the previous day. Value of transactions also went up by 89.89 per cent to settle at N35.535 billion.

An analysis of the investment showed that 

AIICO Insurance led gainers table with 10 per cent, to close at N3.52 per unit, NCR followed with a gain of 9.96 per cent to close at N49.70 per unit, Ikeja Hotel added 9.41 per cent to close at N25.00 per share, Prestige Insurance gained 7.38 per cent to close at N1.60 per share, Sterling Bank up by 6.85 per cent to close at N7.80 per unit.