Movers & Shakers: February 04, 2014

Botswana: DCI +0.13%, USD 6.96m

Much better day in Gaborone today thanks to a cross in Stanchart which accounted for 77% of activity as total value traded amounted to USD 6.96m. There was also some action in Turnstar, Sefalana, Choppies and Letshego.

Egypt: EGX 30 -1.64%, USD 109m

The market continued its profit booking phase today which left the EGX30 index to close at 7,287.64pts down 1.64%. Market volumes remained within recent average on a total turnover of USD 109m. Locals continued with their profit booking sentiment across big caps whilst being net buyers in mid/small caps leaving the EGX70 to outperform +1.28% on the day. COMI took a dip to 32.50 but it wasn’t for long to find support and last printed 32.99 down 1.6%. HRHO also dipped 3% on the day. Heavy profit booking was also evident in the volatile Real estate sector the likes of PHDC, EGTS, and AMER all ended the day more than 2% lower. Moreover, TMGH also plummeted 1.3%.

Kenya: NSE 20 +1.15%, USD 9.2m

Locals once again dominated the day in Nairobi, the difference today is that the bulls returned in full force particularly in the banks. Equity Bank and KNCB found strong local buying that pushed the names up 2.5% and 3.5% to KES 30.50 and KES 44 respectively. They also pulled the other blue chips higher as we saw EABL up by 2.3% to KES 272 and Safcom up 1.3% to KES 11.35. A large foreign cross in BRIT made the name one of the top movers on the day.

Mauritius: Semdex -0.69%, USD 2m

Another active day in Port Louis although the bears won the day. MCB continues to soften and fell by 84bps to Rs 205.75 although some real damage was done in NMH (-2.35%, Rs83) and ENL Land (-1.04%, Rs47.50). SBM closed the day unchanged at Rs1.02.

Nigeria: ASI -0.73%, USD 27.83m

It seems that the rally in banking stocks was short lived as the Bank Index fell -2.01% with tier-1 banks in the form of Guaranty Trust Bank (-3.10%), First Bank (-2.87%) and Access (-2.23%) being the hardest hit. Consumers (+0.13%) managed to close the day in positive territory thanks to Nestle (+1.77%) and and Flour Mills (+1.09%). It was a fairly average day from an activity point of view as value traded amounted to $27.83m with the usual suspects Zenith ($5.92m), Guaranty Trust Bank ($2.70m), Oando ($2.69m) and Nestle ($2.46m) driving activity.

Please note that the index figure above is correct at the time of writing.

South Africa: Top 40 -1.20%, USD 2.09bn

The JSE ended the day lower with the Top 40 Index falling 1.20% to close at 39,945 while value traded amounted to USD 2.09bn. Resources were the day's biggest losers with the Index falling 1.36% followed by Industrials and Financials which fell 1.33% and 0.34% respectively. The Rand was trading at 11.13 and 15.02 to the USD and EUR respectively by the time local markets closed.

Zimbabwe: Industrials +0.64%, Mining -4.25%, USD 3.06m

The Harare bourse extended its winning sequence by yet another day as the Industrials gained 64bps on good volumes. Delta yet again leads the rally as it gained a further 2% to 123.5c while Econet rose by 1.2% to 61c on good volumes. BAT rose by a solid 1.48% to 1370c. 2 special bargains accounted for the increase in volumes through crosses in FBCH and TSL. Foreign investors were net buyers in good volumes.

African Currencies