Movers & Shakers: December 27, 2012

Kenya: NSE 20 +0.33%, USD 1.08m

As with Nigeria, many market participants away for the festive break and hence volumes extremely light with nothing of importance to really note during the session. NMG closed up 3.18% at KES227 but only ridiculously low volume (just 600 shares) traded while Unga Group closed up 5.91% (also on low volume, just 100 shares). Of the larger cap names, Equity Bank closed up 1.06% at KES 23.75 while KNCB ended unchanged on KES 29.75. In the telcos, Safcom and Access both closed up, Safcom (+99bps, KES 5.10) and Access (+1.22%, KES 4.15) with Safcom the most actively traded name on the day. EABL was the second most active name, and closed up 77bps at KES 263.

Nigeria: ASI +0.43%, USD 12.44m

Despite some large crossing activity in Zenith and Nigerian Breweries, the first day back after the Christmas break was extremely dull with not much happening. NB and Zenith accounted for more than half the total turnover, with NB the top trader, yet closed unchanged at N145. The rest of the consumer names were extraordinarily quiet. The banks closed up 52bps, with UBA (+2.74%, N4.50) and Skye Bank (+3.67%, N4.24) leading the bulls while Fidelity (+1.79%, N2.27) was also strong. Dangote Cement closed up 5% at N129.10. In other news, UBA will be suspended from 2-4 Jan due to the planned restructuring.

Zimbabwe: Ind +0.93%, USD 1.34m

The equities market closed the day in the green with only two trading sessions remaining before 2012 comes to an end. The industrial index rose by 93bps to 149.79pts as gainers outnumbered losers by 13 to 3. Econet and Delta were pivotal in the gaining of the index as they each surged +1.12% and +1.88% to close at 450c and 97.09c respectively with Delta setting a new all-time high. Today’s turnover at $1.34m was an improvement from Friday’s $840,000 though it remains low as most market players are on holiday while most of the few still available have deferred most trading into next year. Foreign player’s contributed $0.451 m and $0.841m in purchases and sales trades respectively with back to back trades in CBZ helping the trading session. Econet accounted for 61% of the day’s turnover after 181,231 units exchanged at an improved price of 450c. Recently restructured Zimplow was the leading riser putting on +8.93% to 6.1c whilst M& R added +7.14% to 3c. Hotelier RTG comes in third place rising +5.26% to 2c in the wake of its AGM and EGM today where shareholders approved a $4.5m rights issues. The rights offer will see the company issuing 225 million shares for a subscription price of $0.02 per share at a ratio of 13.6737 shares for every 100 ordinary shares held. Truworths and Barclays gained +4.17% and +4.00% apiece to close at 2.5c and 2.6c. Three stocks did not perform well namely Trust, Padenga and Innscor. Trust lost -33.33% to 0.20c and is also -81.82% in terms of the YTD figures. Padenga traded at 4.5c having retreated -2.17%. Insscor shed 1 cent(1.41%) to trade at 70c. The resources index remained stable at 64.30 pts as the counters recorded no trades.