Lagos — Investors' interest in the shares of Dunlop Nigeria Plc yesterday soared with the company polling the highest volume of shares at the end of transactions at the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE).

Consequently, investors bought a total of 111.6 million shares worth N340.6 million done in 148 deals out of 533.992 million units of shares valued at N6.9 billion done in 12,495 deals during the day.

This development may not be unconnected with present re-positioning of the company's operations.

The management of the company had said at the Annual General Meeting (AGM) held recently that it has been able to leverage on huge financial resources from its last offer to boost its operations.

They intimated that the company is debt-free having liquidated all its debts, putting it in a better position to reward investors.

According to the board, the company has entered a new dawn of rewarding investors by way of dividend payment, saying that 2006 financial year barring all unforeseen circumstances would be the last shareholders will go unrewarded.

On the sectoral chart, the banking sub-sector emerged the most traded with 233.6 million shares worth N4.3 billion which was done in 6,717 deals. Volume in the sector was driven by shares traded in FirstInland Bank and Unity Bank. The duo accounted for 91.2 million units, representing 39.01 per cent of the sub-sector's turnover volume.

The Automobile & Tyre displaced the insurance sub-sector to emerge the second most traded with 111.7 million shares worth N343.5 million done in 176 deals. The insurance sub-sector led by Mutual Benefits Assurance closed as the third most active, accounting for 104.1 million units of shares valued at N318 million in 1,464 deals.

Analysis of price movement chart showed a decline in all the performance indices. While the market capitalisation dropped to N8.117 trillion from N8.208 trillion, the all-share index closed lower at 51,547.81 points.

Flourmill slid N3.67 to lead 67 other stocks on the losers table. Total, nestle, JBerger, and Conoil followed, losing N3.00, N2.89, N2.85 and N2.00.