Global Markets pulled back from record highs to start December, undermined by comments from U.S President Donald Trump and others in his administration suggesting any deal to resolve the trade dispute between the United States and China would not come soon. U.S,the Middle East & Asian Markets rebounded at the end of the week on Friday’s strong U.S. jobs and a change. Saudi Arabia pulled off the biggest initial public offering in history, raising $25.6 billion by selling shares in its giant state-owned oil monopoly. Saudi Aramco sold 3 billion shares at 32 riyals ($8.53) each in its debut IPO.
During the week, Safaricom Plc confirmed of a test phase of an investment tool (Money Market Fund) dubbed Mali in partnership with Genghis Capital. Through Mali, Safaricom hopes to encourage an investing culture targeting it’s subscribers. Stanbic Bank Kenya released the Purchase Managers Index(PMI) indicating that businesses in Kenya registered a sustained improvement in the health of the private sector as the headline PMI remain unchanged at 53.2 in November.
Listed Stocks on the Nairobi Securities Exchange experienced reduced activity through out the week, closing lower as compared to last week. Sustained Foreign interest in Safaricom and Equity Group saw the two stocks close higher and account for close to 50% of the total market transactions. NCBA Group Plc shares moved 1.2Million shares on the last day of trading, raising an eye from capital gains investors as a long term stock. Next week’s activities could be lower as well as show maintained stability majority of the industry starts to break for the Christmas holidays.
The Nairobi Securities Exchange‘s trading week. Week on Week (w-o-w) turnover dipped by 28% to settle at KES 2.8 Billion against last weeks turnover of KES 3.2 Billion with an average daily turnover at 483.5 Million spread across the 5 day trading week against last week’s 562 Million average.
Total Market Volume for the week stood at 82 Million shares implying a sustained market activity of 82 Million shares transacted the previous week. The average daily volume stood at 14.3 Million against last week’s 18.7 Million with Thursday having the highest volume turnover of 21.7 Million shares.
The benchmark NSE All Share Index (NASI) closed Friday at 160.29, representing a week on week gain (W/W) of 1.49%, a 4-week month to month (M/M) loss of 0.43%, and an overall year-to-date (YTD) gain of 14.14%.
The NSE 25 Share Index (NSE25) closed Friday at 3965.47 points, which represented a w/w gain of 1.20%, a M/M loss of 2.60%, and an overall year-to-date (YTD) gain of 11.65%.
The NSE 20 share Index (NSE20) closed at 2621.55 points; indicating a continued week- on-week stability at 0.11%, a 4-week month to month (M/M) loss of 5.25% and a Year to date (YTD) loss of 7.49%.
NSE’s Derivatives Market (NEXT) closed the week with a total of 8 contracts transacted valued at Kes 297,000, indicating a 68% decline in market activities in value & activity as compared to the previous week of 12 contracts valued at Kes 923,000. This is expected to continue as market approaches the short contracts expiry date of December 19th.
The secondary Bond market at the NSE recorded reduced market activity with 4.6 Billion worth of bonds transacting as compared to last week’s value of 12 Billion.
