African Thoughts: August 01, 2016

Nigeria:

The ASI actually ended the week up 1.27% albeit on another ridiculously quiet week. In fact, about the only thing to note in the country was the unexpected increase in the MPR from 12% to 14% on Tuesday. This announcement provided the Banks (+9.05%) with a bid albeit on pretty thin volumes. The major gainers for the week included Guaranty (N24.06, +14.36%), Zenith Bank (N16.91, +10.02%), Okomuoil (N33.66, +6.82%) & Unilever (N34.65, +5.00%). The Consumers closed 38bps in the red driven by losses in Flourmills (N20.20, -5.83%), 7up (N133.00, -5.30%), Cadbury (N14.27, -4.87%) and Guinness (N94.50, -2.05%).

Kenya:

The NSE 20 fell by 10bps (YTD = -13.7%) which now extends the drop for the third consecutive week. Once again we saw Safcom and Equity Bank the major traders for the week. Safcom gained 5.5% to KES19.05 on the back of extremely aggressive foreign buying while Equity Bank closed up 3.4% at KES38.00. KNCB continues to weaken as it closed down 1.5% at KES32.00. EABL ended the week as the leading gainer (+11.2%, KES289) ahead of Friday’s FY16 announcement. Please note that on Tuesday 2 August Deacons will list and begin trading at a price of KES15.00.

Zimbabwe:

ZSE trading activity continues to fall to all-time lows with one session in particular recording only $104 worth of trades – that is not $104k but simply $104! This is the lowest single daily session since dollarization. The Industrials closed the week down 9bps which now extends the YTD loss to 13.94%. Among the large caps we had a mixed week with Econet falling by 3.42% to 19.5c while Delta gained 1.67% to 66.25c.

Mauritius:

The Semdex gained 2.12% while the Sem-10 rose by 1.75% last week. Both indices are only slightly negative for 2016 thus far. As always, activity was heavily centered on the banks as we witnessed MCBG rise by 10bps to RS207.50 while SBMH climbed by an impressive 6.2%Rs0.69. The rest of the market was uneventful.

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