African Thoughts: May 23, 2016

Nigeria:

The ASI gained 2.60% last week with strength in both the banks (+6.60%) and consumers (+1.94%). Buyers as well as general interest seems to be returning to the Lagos bourse after the previous week's removal of the fuel subsidy. The major gainers for the week included UBA (N4.45, +22.59%), Access Bank (N5.35, +10.77%), Wapco (N77.40, +8.71%) and NB (N126.00, +6.82). Other gainers in the banks were Zenith Bank (N15.95, +8.50%) and Guaranty (N20.20, +7.85%). The Consumers were driven by gains in NB (N126.00, +6.82%), Dangsugar (N6.30, +4.13%) and Nestle (N732.50, +1.45%).

Kenya:

It was a painfully quiet week as interest definitely shifting from Kenya towards Nigeria (from a foreign perspective). As is always the case, activity was focused on the large caps. We saw Safcom and EABL both gain 30bps to close at KES17.35 and KES297 respectively. The banks had a mixed week with Equity Bank gaining 60bps to KES40.50 while KNCB fell by 2.4% to KES40.75.

Zimbabwe:

Profit taking after the recent rally was the name of the game in Harare last week. The ZSE fell by 1.66% and is now down 7.88% YTD. It was the market heavyweights that bore the brunt of the sell-off. Most notable was Econet which fell by 8.33% to 22c ahead of the release of their FY16 announcement. Delta had been solid all week at 75c before falling off a cliff on Friday by 3.33% to close the week at 72.5c. Dairibord was also a notable faller as it dropped by 8.33% to 5.5c.

Mauritius:

The 2 banks dragged the Semdex down by 90bps while the Sem-10 fell by 1.30%. MCBG continued on its downward trend thanks to foreign selling as the name closed at Rs207 (-1.4%). SBMH followed suit as it fell by 2.9% to Rs0.67).

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