Equities Roaring Back to Positivity as the Shilling Weakens

Equities logged gains for the second day in a row with major indices closing higher supported by 160.9 percent higher turnover as economic uncertainty continues to fade after the 26^th Presidential repeat polls.

The East African Breweries Ltd topped the highest traded counters subsequently followed by Kenya Commercial Bank, Safaricom Limited, and British American Tobacco Kenya Ltd. East African Breweries Limited and Kenya Commercial Bank accounted for 39.6 percent and 28.7 percent (respectively) of market activity of the day.

Foreign participation ticked up to 78.5 percent with activity inclining towards East African Breweries, Kenya Commercial Bank, Safaricom Limited, and British American Tobacco.

Net buys were on SCOM, KCB and Centum Investments while net sells were on KenolKobil Ltd and Britam Holdings Plc. For the second day, foreign investors were net buyers in the session recording total net inflow of 5.69 million shillings.

Bond turnover, on the other hand, rose 128.0 percent to 2.1 billion shillings on 48 deals in the session from 41 deals traded previously.

In other market news, the Kenyan Shilling has remained resilient though still at the mercy of the US Dollar, the Sterling Pound, and the Euro.

The Kenyan Shilling weakened against the US Dollar by 1.18 percent on a year-to-date basis. The same trend was witnessed against the Sterling Pound where the shilling weakened by weakened 8.95% year-to-date basis. Against the Euro, the Kenyan Shilling weakened 12.34 percent on the same basis.

The market turnover at the bourse went up 161.3 percent to USD 7.3 million or an equivalent of 760.4 million shillings from Tuesday’s trading.

The NSE 20 and NASI gained 1.49 percent and 1.17 percent to close the day at 3,729.62 and 161.99 respectively while foreign investors assumed a net buying position by accounting for 79.3 percent of total market purchases and 77.8 percent of total market sales.

On the East African Community Markets, in Rwanda, the RSE RSI and RASI declined 0.13 percent and 0.02 percent to close the day at 127.44 and 132.35 respectively while in Uganda, the USE ALSI and USE LCI dropped 0.32 percent each to close at 1,679.71 and 385.23 respectively.