The monthly foreign inflows through the Nigeria Stock Exchange, NSE, into the country, leaped by 403.09% to N73.15 billion in May 2017 from N14.54 billion in April, according to the NSE Foreign Portfolio Investment (FPI) report.
Although foreign inflows outpaced outflows, foreign outflows also increased by 178.63% from N7.91 billion in April to N22.04 billion in May 2017, an indication of improved foreign investor appetite/ renewed foreign interest in Nigerian equities which analysts said was been responsible for the recent rally in equities.
According to the report, total FPI transactions from January to May 2017 increased by 74.03% from N189.45 billion in 2016 to N328.70 billion in 2017.
A breakdown by the NSE showed that domestic transactions outperformed foreign investors by 7.40 percent, even when participation rate dropped sharply from 59.1% in April to 53.7% for May.
In value rated terms, domestic transactions improved 240% in May from N32.5 billion to N110.42bn, whilst the total domestic transactions Year to Date (YtD) increased by 38.40% from N279.11 billion to N386.29 billion.
Foreign Portfolio Investments YTD participation rate increased from 40.4% in 2016 to 45.9% as at May 2017 slashing domestic participation to 54.0%. FPI transactions expanded 3.2x from N22.5bn in April to N95.2bn in May.
The total market transactions from January to May 2017 thus surged 52.6% to N715.0bn from N468.6bn recorded for the same period in 2016, Worldstage reports.
Expectedly, total transaction for the month of May, increased sharply by 275% from N54.9bn recorded in the month of April to N205.6bn in May 2017, thanks to the introduction of the I&E window by the CBN in April.
An overview of the market showed that the All Share Index was up 23.2% YTD, 12.3% MTD and 3.1% WTD.
