Movers & Shakers: July 23, 2012

African Currencies as at GMT 15:30

Botswana: DCI -0.01%, USD 35k

The DCI commenced the week 0.01% in the red at 7,325.59pts. Furnmart saw 101,823 shares trade in the name at 160t. letshego was level at 140t on 50,300 shares. Choppies and ABCH were unchanged at 163t and 450t.

Egypt: Closed today

Kenya: NSE 20 +0.11%, USD 2.24m

Rather quiet day in Kenya with value traded amounting to a lack luster $2.24m. EABL led from the front in terms of value traded as foreigners accounted for all of the volume on both sides of the counter with a total of 350k shares traded in the counter. Kenya Airways was relatively active thanks to a decent cross that went through early on with both the buyer and seller being local as 2.12m shares changed hands in the counter. Kenya Commercial Bank was fairly quiet ahead of results (due to report on Thursday) as foreigners accounted for 49% of purchases with 1.78m shares traded throughout the day. Foreigners were net buyers and accounted for $1.17m of total purchases while they accounted for $1.05m of total sales. The market closed higher with the NSE 20 Index gaining 0.11% to close at 3,844.61. Kenya’s trade deficit widened to $1.03bn in May as imports jumped.

Mauritius: Semdex +0.06%, USD 1.1m

The market opened the week on a positive note with the Semdex and the Sem-7 up 0.06% and 0.35% respectively. MCB edged up 0.60% at Rs167. SBM lost 0.61% at Rs81.50. NMH was up 1.54% at Rs66. ENL Land traded 1.35 higher at Rs38.50. Sun decreased by 0.9% to Rs33. The group released its Q2 2012 result which reported higher losses of Rs146m for the same period last year.

Nigeria: ASI +1.24%, USD 13.41m

A strong day to start the week in Lagos despite no significant results getting released. The main reason for the outperformance of the market was Dangcem which closed limit up at N120.75 after the news that the Lagos State Government unveiled a new deal with Dangote Cement and Lafarge Wapco for supplies of cement products. Interestingly, Wapco traded down -2.25% on good volume today. Volumes in general remain on the thin side with just $13.41mill trading today. Once again we saw the banks the most actively traded, although the BNK10 closed down 4bps, the softness mostly attributed to Access (-4.8%) and FCMB (-4.85%). Banks are having some yoyo performance in recent sessions and UBA was the notable outperformer for a change up 2.63% to close at N4.29.

South Africa: Top 40 -1.30%, USD 1.05bn

The JSE closed the day lower with the Top 40 Index falling 1.30% to close at 29,682 while value traded amounted to USD 1.05bn. Resources were the day's biggest losers with the Index falling 1.60% followed by Industrials and Financials which fell 1.35% and 0.89% respectively. The Rand was trading at 8.45 and 10.24 to the USD and EUR respectively by the time local markets closed.

Zambia: LuSE -0.34%, USD 52k

Quiet day in Zambia with value traded amounting to USD 52k. The names that traded included CECZ, SCBL, ZNCO and ZSUG. CECZ was the biggest contributor towards turnover with value traded in the name amounting to USD 46k. ZNCO was the second biggest contributor towards turnover with value traded in the name amounting to USD 6k.

Zimbabwe: Industrial Index +0.20%, Mining +1.64%, USD 1.7m

The industrial index gained 0.20% to close at 132.29 points spurred by gains in Econet which rose 0.05% to 425.2c, OK which picked 0.91% to 11.1c and Innscor which added 1.75% to 58c.TPH led the gains rising 8% to 10.8c while banking group ZBFH advanced 5% to 10.5c despite concerns that the RBZ intends to raise minimum capital levels for financial institutions in the mid-term monetary policy review expected at the end of the month. The mining index extends gains rising 1.64% to 107.34points. Rio gained 6.38% to 50c spurred by reports that the group seeks to raise $200m at subsidiary level after creating specialized subsidiaries in the group’s main business lines, gold, diamonds, base metals, energy and coal.