Movers & Shakers: October 12, 2012

African Currencies

Botswana: DCI +0.37%, USD 959k

After the market being closed yesterday due to system issue there was quite a bit of activity today with value traded amounting to USD 959k thanks to crosses in Letshego and Choppies. ABCH (415t, +5t), Choppies (190t, +4t) and Sefalana (310t, +5t) were the only names that closed the day higher while there were no stocks that closed in negative territory.

Egypt: Closed for the day.

Kenya: NSE 20 -0.05%, USD 1.97m

Nairobi was most evident by the lack of foreign participation today. Foreigners were only 34% of the buys and 5% of the sells in the market. Local crossing in BMBC was approximately half the market although there was some foreign buying evident. The banks were extremely muted as buyers and sellers look over the fence at each other with on one daring to blink as both EqBnk and KNCB closed unchanged at 23.25 and 28 respectively.

Mauritius: Semdex -0.32%, USD 1.27m

A rather quiet end to the week on the island with turnover reaching $1.27mill. Once again, MCB dominated the charts with the name closing down Rs1 at Rs162 on good volumes. The rest of the Sem7 stocks were either unchanged or slightly down with ENL Land (-1.25%), Rogers (-1.69%) and Terra (-0.80%) all closing the day down.

Nigeria: ASI -0.31%, USD 24.26m

Activity levels in Nigeria remain upbeat as both local and foreign investors continue to be involved. As always, the banking sector dominates turnover as well as dictating market direction. Today the BNK10 closed down 40bps and the ASI closed down 31bps. Tier 1 banking names were the most actively traded yet most of the names were little changed on the day as the bulls take a breather after some recent excitement. Tier 2 banks were on the back foot for the session with most names, except Skye Bank, closing in the red. The consumer names once again saw NB dominating the volume charts and the name closed up 71bps at N142 and Unilever also saw a lot of action yet closed unchanged at N43. Dangote Sugar had a torrid day, closing down 9.33% at N6.12, despite the heroics of yesterday.

South Africa: Top 40 -0.24%, USD 1.09bn

The JSE ended the day lower with the Top 40 Index falling 0.24% to close at 32,276 while value traded amounted to USD 1.09bn. Resources were the day's biggest losers with the Index falling 0.77% while Financials and Industrials gained 0.26% and 0.04% respectively. The Rand was trading at 8.63 and 11.18 to the USD and EUR respectively by the time local markets closed.

Zambia: LuSE -0.01%, USD 185k

Much better day in Zambia today with value traded amounting to USD 185k thanks to crosses in CEC and SCZ. The names that traded included CECZ, NATBREW, SCZ, ZMBF and ZNCO. CECZ was the biggest contributor towards turnover with value traded in the name amounting to USD 131k. SCZ was the second biggest contributor towards turnover with value traded in the name amounting to USD 40k.

Zimbabwe: Industrial Index +0.37%, Mining Index unch, USD 3.38m

The industrial index consolidated yesterday’s gains with a +0.37% rise to 154.62pts as turnover more than trebled due to the CBZ special bargain. The trade saw 20m shares of banking group exchange hands at 10.5c accounting for 65% of value traded. Improved volumes in fast foods giant 762,789 units exchange hands as the stock closed +1.20% firmer at 76c. Significant trades were also seen in Delta that witnessed 524,550 shares trading at a new all time high price of 87.5c having moved up 2.9%. On a week on week basis the industrial index rose 2.83 points (1.86%). The mining index stocks remained steady at 87.48points with a measly 345 shares changing hands in Bindura at an unchanged price of 2.8c. The rest of the resource stocks did not trade. The mining index is however 0.21% up on week on week basis.