Kenya Equity Watch | 28 July 2015: Market activities are heavy at the Nairobi Securities Exchange … Stocks witness gains

Nairobi, Kenya (Capital Markets in Africa) — Kenya equity markets witnessed a positive return at end of Tuesday’s trading session. The market capitalization rose by KES 1.13 billion (about US$11.1 million) to end at KES 2,143.97 billion relative to market capitalization of KES 2,142.84 billion recorded at previous trading session.

T he Nairobi Securities Exchange (NSE20) index gained 18.35 points or 0.41 percent to close at 4,485.71 points and the Nairobi All Share Index marginally advanced by 0.08 points or 0.05 percent to settle at 153.10 points. On the hand, the FTSE NSE 15 index and FTSE NSE 25 index remained unchanged at 200.17 points and 199.91 respectively.

Look at today’s market activities, the volume of shares traded jumped 65.25 percent to close at 33.64 million and total turnover mounted 74.77 percent to close at KES 806.36 million. Equity Group was the largest mover of the day with a turnover of KES 372.19 million representing 46.16 percent of the total market turnover.  Among five top actively traded stocks by turnover were KCB Group recorded a turnover of KES 129.197 million and SAFARICOM Limited registered KES 100.212 million. Also, KENOIL KOBIL and Kenya Power recorded a turnover of KES 67.006 million and KES 24.947 million respectively. In term of type of investor, buys stood at 87.47 percent of total turnover, while foreign sales stood at 69.48 percent of total turnover.

Today’s price mover was National Bank which emerged as the top gainer after adding 15.49 percent to end the day at KES 15.49 on 47,600 traded shares. Standard Group Kenya climbed by 8.90 percent to close the day at KES 39.75 and British-American Investments Company Kenya advanced by 7.36 percent to settle at KES 16.05. Similarly, Liberty Holdings Limited and TPS Eastern Africa climbed by 7.14 percent to settle at KES 22.50 and 6.06 percent to settle at KES 35.00 respectively.

On the contrary the price slacker was KAKUZI Kenya emerged as the top loser after falling by 9.72 percent to end the day at KES 325.00. Likewise, Eveready East Africa Kenya traded at KES 3.70 by losing 8.64 percent on 16,900 traded shares. On the same trend, Home Afrika Limited and Longhorn Kenya Limited tumbled by 3.92 percent to trade at KES 2.45 and 2.96 percent to end at KES 6.55 respectively. News Media Group also declined by 2.70 percent to end at KES 180.00 after investors bought and sold about 7,900 shares.

On foreign exchange market front, Kenya Shilling shrank against majority of the trading currencies today. Kenyan Shilling lost value against US dollar by 0.74 percent to trade at KES 102.05. Also, Kenyan Shilling declined against British pound by 1.09 percent to end at KES 158.99 and against the Euro to close at KES 113.05, by losing 1.42 percent. Likewise, Kenyan shilling depreciated by 0.86 percent against South African rand to trade at KES 8.10.