March 18 (Lagos) - A key gas pipeline blew up in Rivers state in the South South of Nigeria. It is not yet clear what led to the blown up pipeline.
This would up the tension in the state which already is going through some political uncertainty.
Tensions also rose among the public as a youth-corps member called out the Nigerian President for failed policies and lack of control on inflation. That led to her being threatened by officials which further led the issue getting snow-balled into massive online trends against the government policies.
The stock market is responding positively to these events for now, but do not be surprised if things turn sour quickly. Perhaps bank results backed by government set fees and tariffs on transactions could boost the market. The Nigerian government now makes customers pay a fee on every online transaction that is made on any bank app, so that boosts the bank earnings and will help their financial results in an otherwise stagnant environment.
Higher benchmark lending rates of the CBN could also improve the net interest margin for banks so the market is holding up in anticipation of positive earnings from the so called big banks like
GTCO ,
ZENITHBANK ,
UBA and
ACCESSCORP before the end of month.