Ghana Equity Markets | 9 Sep 2015: Ghana Stock Exchange equity markets return to red after a day in green

Accra, Ghana Capital Markets in Africa —  The bear returned to the Ghana Stock Exchange equity trading at the end of Tuesday’s trading session. The equities market capitalization went down by GHS 251 million (about US$10 million)  to close at GHS 62,643 million relative to market capitalization of GHS 62,894 recorded at previous trading session.

The benchmark composite index went down by 8.91 points or 0.44 percent to close the day at 2,094.70 points, representing a year-to-date performance 0f -7.36 percent. The financial Index slumped by 10.23 points or 0.49 percent to trade at 2,056.23 with a year-to-date return of -8.35 percent.

From the market activity perspective, the total volume was 79,428 (a fall of about 84.19 percent from previous trading session total volume of 502,353 shares) and total traded value was GHS 47,747 million (a fall of about 97 percent compared with previous trading session value of GHS 1.570). SIC Insurance recorded 57,325 shares (almost 73 percent of the total volume) to value at GHS 7,452 (about 15.61 percent of the total value traded). Other most actively traded stocks were HORDS Ghana (recorded 9,900 shares at GHS 693), Ecobank Transnational Incorporation Togo (recorded a volume of 4,432 shares valued at GHS 1,328), Unilever Ghana (registered 2,296 shares valued at GHS 17,268) and Fan Milk Ghana (traded 1,502 shares with total value of GHS 9,778). The top five most actively traded stocks by volume accounted for almost 95 percent of the total volume and about 77 percent of the total value traded.

Looking at the price movers and shakers, out of the 16 traded securities via 70 transactions, two gainers and three losers were recorded, so the market breath/sentiment ended negative. Unilever Ghana rose to GHS 7.52 by adding GHS 0.02 or 0.27 percent and Fan Milk Ghana surged to GHS 6.51 from GHS 6.50 by gaining 0.15 percent. Whereas, Ghana Oil went down by 2.81 percent to end at GHS 1.73, Ecobank Transnational Incorporation Togo drifted down by 3.23 percent to stop at GHS 0.30 and Mechanical Llyod sagged by 6.25 percent at GHS 0.15.

On the foreign exchange market front, the Ghanaian Cedi continued to drop against major trading currencies. The Cedi traded against the US dollar at GHS 3.7141 and traded at GHS 4.1548 against the Euro by falling by 0.36 percent. The Cedi added value against Swiss franc to settle at GHS 3.7983 by adding 0.09 percent. Ghanaian currency dropped by 0.77 percent to close at GHS 5.7076 and lost 1.74 percent to end at GHS 0.2703 against British pound and South Africa rand respectively.