Movers & Shakers: August 31, 2012

African Currencies

Botswana: DCI +0.08%, USD 941k

The value traded was very high by Botswana standards but as is generally the case in Botswana this is skewed towards Letshego, today was no different as Letshego accounted for 80% of the total activity. The other contribotors worth mentioning were Barclays, Stanchart and BIHL. 2 names advanced while three fell back. BIHL added +5t to close at 1030, RDCP added +5t to close at 700 whike the three losers were NAP, Primetime and Stanchart which lost -3t, -5t and -2t respectively.

Egypt: Closed on Fridays

Kenya NSE 20 -0.24%, USD 2.5m

Equity turnover notched 6% higher to USD 2.5m as activity improved slightly. The NSE 20 index declined for the day as losers outnumbered gainers. There were 19 losers, 14 gainers while the rest remained unchanged. Foreign investor activity notched up to 39.7% compared to 30.5% of total trades in the previous session. NIC Bank rights traded for the last day during the session, rising 21.3% to KES 9.95. During the session, strong demand for the rights saw them trade a high of KES 13. Bamburi, KenolKobil and KCB Bank were the leading movers of the day, together accounting for 57.3% of market volumes. KenolKobil inched slightly lower despite foreign investor buying. Bamburi, the Lafarge affiliated cement maker, shed 4.5% on foreign investor selling. Mumias Sugar was unchanged for the day as the miller announced a 4.1% growth in FY12 EPS on the back of a tax credit. Mumias maintained its final DPS for the year unchanged at KES 0.50. Kakuzi did not trade during the session even as it announced flat 1H12 results. Diamond Trust Bank also did not trade as it announced an 86.2% oversubscription rate on its just concluded KES 2.1bn rights offer.

Mauritius: Semdex +0.32%, USD 2.32m

Decent day to end the week with value traded amounting to a rather pleasing USD 2.32m while the market closed the day higher with the Semdex gaining 0.32% to close at 1,686.45. There were crosses in MCB and SBM with a total of 141k shares and 101k shares traded in the names respectively. Both major banking stocks managed to close in positive territory with MCB gaining 0.62% to close at 162.00 while SBM gained 0.61% to close at 82.00. NMH was strong today and managed to gain 1.79% to close at 57.00 while Rogers closed the day flat 308.00.

Nigeria: ASI +0.2%, USD 15.77m

The top tier banks struggled today, FBN, GTB, Zenith and Access all lost ground with UBA the lone name in the black although only marginally so, +0.22%. Outside the top tier banks DangC made a gain of +0.97%, this obvioulsy had a large part to play in the mkt index move due to the large mkt cap of DangC. Cadbury shot lights ouot, limit up at 17.85. while DangS also put in a stronmg performance +2.96%, another Dangote name DangF lost -1.76% in the session. 22 stocks advanced, 23 declined and 68 remained unchanged. The highest value of trades were in Zenith, FBN, GTB, Interbrew and Access.

South Africa: Top 40 +0.23%, USD 2bn

The JSE ended the day marginally higher with the Top 40 Index gaining +0.27% to close at 31,172.74. Value traded breached the $2bn level - much higher than has become the norm of late. There were large block trades in some stocks that go ex div on Monday. The golds and resource names struggled most with the golds the hardest hit -1.55%. The financials and banks were the outperformers +0.84% and +0.86% respectively.

Zambia: LuSE +0.02%, USD 28k

A very quiet day in Lusaka today with the mkt only trading $28k worth while trading sideways. Only 6 stocks traded on the day being Zanaco, Shoprite and Batz. Two names made price gains while one lost ground. The two albeit marginal winners were Shop and Znco while Zain fell -0.14%.

Zimbabwe: Industrial Index +0.18%, Mining Index unch, USD 438k

Very quiet in Harare today with value traded amounting to USD 438k. AICO was the leader in terms of value traded as a total of 1.61m shares traded while Delta continued to rally with 120k shares traded at 71c. Industrials closed the day in positive territory with the Index gaining 0.18% to close at 132.27 while the Mining Index closed the day unchanged at 89.04 as there were no trades in the sector.