Key points
- Airtel Africa remains the most valuable listed company on the Nigerian stock market.
- Nigerian telecom giant MTN Nigeria has overtaken Dangote Cement as the second most capitalized company on the Nigerian stock market in the first quarter of 2023.
- The Nigerian stock market rose 5.82% in the first quarter of 2023.
Nigerian telecom giants Airtel Africa and MTN Nigeria topped the list of the most valuable listed companies in Nigeria in the first quarter of 2023, with market capitalizations of N5.56 trillion and N4.89 trillion respectively.
This is according to tracked data from the Nigerian Exchange (NGX). The list of most valuable companies also included giant cement producers Dangote and BUA Cement, as well as consumer goods producers BUA Foods and Nestlé Nigeria.
Zenith Bank, Geregu Power, Guaranty Trust Holdings and Seplat Petroleum completed the list of the ten most valuable companies in the country. The top ten elite companies on the NGX accounted for a significant portion of the equity market capitalization.
Specifically, the ten companies are valued at N24.09 trillion as of March 31, 2023, representing approximately 82% of the total market value.
How the market behaved
The Nigerian stock market rallied 5.82% in the first quarter of 2023, capitalizing on the gains recorded the previous year (2022: 19.98%).
- The All-Share Index opened the year at 51,251.06 basis points and closed the review quarter at 54,232.34 points.
- In the same vein, the market capitalization gained N1.63 trillion between January and March 2023 to close the quarter at N29.54 trillion.
- The market had enjoyed a strong positive start to the year, posting a year-to-date gain of 8.9% to March 9, 2023, before it began to decline, reaching 5.82% at the end of the quarter.
- The rise in interest rates announced by the CBN in the context of the fall encouraged investors to allocate their capital to alternative high-yield fixed-income instruments.
MTN overtakes Cemento Dangote in 2nd position
Nigerian telecom giant MTN Nigeria has overtaken Dangote Cement as the second most capitalized company on the Nigerian stock market in the first quarter of 2023.
- MTN Nigeria, which was valued at N4.38 trillion at the end of 2022, recorded a growth of 11.6% to stand at N4.89 trillion at the end of March 2023, outpacing the 3.4% growth recorded in the value of Dangote’s shares. Cement.
- In particular, the market value of Dangote Cement increased from 4.45 trillion naira at the beginning of the year to close the quarter at 4.6 trillion naira, representing an increase of 153.4 billion naira, compared to with MTN Nigeria’s 508.9 billion naira.
- However, the second position remains hotly contested between the two companies as they tend to alternate month to month.
Telecom companies remain dominant
The two telecommunications companies listed on the Nigerian stock market remain the most capitalized companies in the country, together accounting for 35.4% of the total market.
- The impressive growth in the valuation of telcos is not far-fetched, considering the increased use of internet services worldwide and in Nigeria after the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.
- Mobile phone and Internet subscribers have increased significantly in the last two years. According to data from the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), total GSM internet subscribers increased to 156.4 million in February 2023, up from 125.7 million at the end of 2019.
- Along the same lines, telecommunications companies have also posted impressive financial numbers. MTN Nigeria reported revenue of 2.01 trillion naira in 2022, an increase of 21.6% from 1.65 trillion naira the previous year. Net profit also increased by 21.1% to Naira 361.5 billion.
- Airtel Africa also posted a year-on-year revenue increase of 12.1% for the nine months ending December 2022 to $3.91 billion, though after-tax profit only increased marginally by 1.7% to $523 million over the same period. .
Below are the most valuable companies as of March 2023:
biggest winners
Tripple Gee and Company led the list of biggest gainers during the review period in percentage terms, as market value increased 241.8% to N945.4 million, closely followed by International Energy Insurance at 239. 5% to N1,170 million. Neimeth International increased its market capitalization by 128.1% to 3.48 billion naira at the end of March 2023.
In absolute value terms, BUA Foods earned N666 billion to stand at N1.84 trillion, followed by MTN Nigeria with an increase of N508.8 billion to stand at N4.88 trillion, while the market value of Dangote Cement grew by N153.4 billion to stand at N4.6 trillion.
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