Trading at the Nigerian Stock Exchange closed in bullish for the third consecutive trading session on Wednesday.  The All-Share Index (ASI) advanced further by 0.85% to close at 26,837.42 points.

Similarly, the overall market capitalization size gained N119 billion to close today at N14.027 trillion.

• The upturn was impacted by gains recorded in large and medium capitalized stocks, including Total, MTN Nigeria, Guaranty Trust Bank, and Zenith Bank.
• A total volume of 322 million units of shares, valued at N4.03billion exchanged hands in 4,046 deals
  STERLINGBANK was the most traded shares by volume at 83.6million units while ZENITHBANK topped by value at N443.3million.
• Investor sentiment as measured by market breadth was positive as 21 stocks advanced against 9 decliners. TOTAL (+10.00%) led the gainer’s chart, while NB (-6.76%) finished the top loser.
• Sector Performance was mainly positive as four of the five indices recorded gains.
• NSE Banking Index: Advanced by 1.93%, lifted by FCMB (+4.29%), GUARANTY (+3.70%) and ZENITHBANK (+2.00%).
• NSE Industrial Index: Gained 1.40%, on buy interest in DANGCEM (+2.81%).
• NSE Oil & Gas Index: Improved by 0.94%, on TOTAL (+10.00%) price appreciation.
• NSE Insurance Index: Up marginally by 31%, saved by WAPIC (+5.71%) and CUSTODIAN (+4.00%)
• NSE Consumer Goods Index: Down by -1.66%, on sell-offs in NB (-6.76%), PZ (-5.88%) and DANGSUGAR (-0.80%

Top gainers

• TOTAL up 10.00% to close at N96.8
• UACN up 9.45% to close at N6.95
• GUARANTY up 3.70% to close at N28.05
• DANGCEM up 2.81% to close at N142.9
• MTNN up 1.18% to close at N129

Top Losers

• UPL down 6.77% to close at N1.24
• NB down 6.76% to close at N49
• PZ down 5.88% to close at N4
• UBN down 2.91% to close at N5
• DANGSUGAR down 0.80% to close at N12.4

Outlook

Nigerian bourse continued its bullish run for a 3-day running streak amid selling pressures in crude oil and global equities.

• The recent affirmation by a global financial rating agency,(Fitch Ratings) has revised the Outlook on Nigeria’s Long-Term Foreign-Currency Issuer Default Rating (IDR) to Stable from Negative and affirmed the IDR at ‘B’ showing the worse seems to be over, as crude oil prices, Nigeria’s major earning is selling at a profitable price margin, coupled with the Foreign exchange restrictions on certain goods, have kept the nations foreign reserve fairly relatively stable.
• Also, significant buying pressures from blue-chip stocks which include Total, GTBank, MTN Nigeria, and Dangote cement kept the bullish momentum fired up on all cylinders
• In spite of the gains recorded in the past few weeks, Nairametrics envisages caution when choosing stocks to buy as the COVID-19 pandemic remain on major headlines around the world coupled with the rising cost of goods and services, dampening the morale of retail investors relatively.

Ethereum whales are going for a rebound as price pick up from its recent lows.

Statistics seen from Whale Alert, an advanced crypto tracker showed large investors moved over 700,00 Ether coins in five different transactions from unknown wallets to unknown wallets.

READ: Over 1,000,000 stolen XRP transferred from Kucoin to major crypto exchanges

Highlights of some transactions seen by Nairametrics include;

🚨 🚨 🚨 🚨 🚨 148,275 #ETH (52,646,171 USD) transferred from unknown wallet to unknown wallet

Tx: https://t.co/5qqkrVNIbh

— Whale Alert (@whale_alert) September 30, 2020

🚨 🚨 🚨 🚨 135,855 #ETH (48,319,376 USD) transferred from unknown wallet to unknown wallet

Tx: https://t.co/ca0rm5OOQW

— Whale Alert (@whale_alert) September 30, 2020

🚨 🚨 🚨 🚨 136,912 #ETH (48,695,421 USD) transferred from unknown wallet to unknown wallet

Tx: https://t.co/20bGt3velM

— Whale Alert (@whale_alert) September 30, 2020

READ: Investor moves $133 million worth of Bitcoins, suspected from Coinbase

What you should know; Nairametrics had in recent times, observed the high movement by these Ethereum whales as these large entities have purchased almost half of all the Ethereum mined so far in 2020

At the time this report was drafted Ethereum traded at $357.11 with a daily trading volume of about $10 Billion. ETH price is up 0.1% in the last 24 hours. It has a circulating supply of 110 Million coins and a max supply of ∞ coins.

READ: Warning signs: Ethereum daily active wallets hit a 67-day low

Whales are basically large entities that own a significant amount of Ethers This means that an Ethereum whale would be a single Ethereum address owning around 1,000 Ethereum or more.

Ethereum is a cryptocurrency designed for decentralized applications and deployment of smart contracts, which are created and operated without any fraud, interruption, control or interference from a third party.

READ: After 22 years, NBS is set to commence National Business Sample Census

Quick fact; Ethereum 2.0 is an upgrade that aims to solve the blockchain trilemma – security, scalability, and decentralization.

• In alternative smart contract platforms, they are designed to be highly scalable but compromises on decentralization.
• Whereas a highly secured and decentralized blockchain network would have the trade-off being highly unscalable.
• Ethereum 2.0 brings a very different flavor of design that aims to address those issues by way of using Proof-of-Stake (POS), Beacon Chain, Sharding, and Execution Environment. Due to the complexity of the project, the development will take place in 3 phases

Dangote Sugar refinery Plc (DSR) a major subsidiary of the Dangote Group, has disclosed that it has listed 146,878,241 additional ordinary shares on the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE), as a result of the recent merger with Savannah Sugar Company Limited.

This disclosure signed by Head, Listings Regulation Department, Godstime Iwenekhai, was released during trading hours on Wednesday.

In line with the resolution passed at the Court-Ordered meeting of members of Dangote Sugar Refinery Plc on the 9th of July 2020, the additional shares listed on the Exchange arose from the Scheme of Merger between Dangote Sugar Refinery Plc and Savannah Sugar Company Limited (SSCL).

The additional 146,878,241 ordinary shares of 50 kobo listed are in consideration for the transfer by SSCL of all its assets, liabilities and business undertakings, including real property and intellectual property rights to DSR.

Hence, these shares shall be issued and allotted to the shareholders of SSCL (The Scheme Shareholders), in place of 162,756,968 ordinary shares held by the Scheme Shareholders in SSCL as at close of business on the terminal Date, when Dangote Sugar merged with Savannah Sugar Company Limited.

(READ MORE:First Bank tops as Nigerian banks record lower E-business income)

With the listing of the additional 146,878,241 ordinary shares, the total issued and fully paid-up shares of Dangote Sugar Refinery Plc has now increased from 12,000,000,000 to 12,146,878,241 ordinary shares of 50 kobo each.

Financial performance of Dangote Sugar Refinery Plc

Results for the first half of 2020 ended June 30, 2020, show revenue increased from N80.363 billion in the corresponding period of 2019 to N103 billion, as the company continue to benefit from border closure.

However, the profit of the company in H1 2020 was marginally higher than the profit in the corresponding period of 2019, as a result of higher raw material and consumables costs which rose faster than the increase in revenue.