Shilling Closes The Week in the Red As Equities Edge Up

The Shilling

The Kenyan shilling closed the week on a losing end as Equities edged up despite turnover pulling back by 62.8 percent from Thursday’s trading.

The Kenyan shilling weakened against the US Dollar by 1.22 percent on a year-to-date basis. The shillings dipped further against the Sterling pound by 8.47 percent and by 12.83 percent against the Euro.

Kenyan Stock Market

On Kenyan Stock Market, the market turnover at the bourse dropped 62.8 percent to USD 3.48 million shillings or an equivalent of 361.11 million shillings from Thursday’s trading.

The NSE 20 and NASI gained 0.62 percent each to close the day at 3,800.43 and 164.50 respectively while foreign investors assumed a net buying position by accounting for 66.2 percent of total market purchases and 61.1 percent of total market sales.

EAC Markets

On the EAC Markets, in Rwanda, the RSE RSI and RASI dropped 0.24 percent and 0.10 percent to close at 133.48 and 133.12 respectively while in Uganda, the USE ALSI rose 1.22 percent while USE LCI declined 0.05 percent to close at 1,748.40 and 385.06 respectively.

Equities

Equities edged up at the close of the week despite turnover pulling back 62.8 percent from Thursday’s session to trade shares worth 361 million shillings.

Activity centered on Safaricom Limited, Equity Group Holdings, KCB Group and Kenya Re-Insurance Corporation Ltd mainly from foreign investor activity.

SCOM gained (+1.0%) for the second day after announcing a 21.4% y/y growth in its 1H18 EPS, with a dominant trading concentration, at 35.3% of total market turnover.

Foreign investors dominated the market at 63.5 percent from 56.7 percent previously. Net accumulation was on SCOM, NIC Bank Ltd (NSE: NIC) and KenGen Company Ltd (NSE: KEGN) while exiting KCB, EABL and Britam Holdings Plc (NSE: BRIT). Foreigners reversed yesterday’s stance to be net buyers in the session, with a net inflow of KES 9.2Mn.