Nairobi bourse key indices end week down as trading falls

The number of shares traded at the Nairobi Securities Exchange (NSE) dropped to 13 million on Friday, valued at 2.9 million U.S. dollars from a peak of 19 million shares worth 6.7 million on Thursday as the bourse ended the week on a low.

The decline saw the week-on-week turnover go down to 200 million dollars on a volume of 78 million shares, down from 260 million dollars on 92 million shares posted the previous week.

Kenya's leading telecom Safaricom was Friday's biggest mover, trading 5 million shares at an average of 0.17 dollars, a 0.29 percent rise.

The telecom in total traded 21.3 million shares during week, accounting for 27 percent of the week's traded volume.

The banking sector, on the other hand, had 26 million shares traded which accounted for 33 percent of the week's traded volume.

In the category, Equity Group Holdings was the most heavily traded counter with 9.1 million shares changing hands at between 0.40 dollars and 0.41 dollars.

Kenya Commercial Bank (KCB) Group, on the other hand, went down 2.4 percent during the week to 0.40 dollars, moving 7.1 million shares.

The energy and petroleum sector moved 8.9 million shares, with KenGen and KenolKobil trading 3.4 million and 2.9 million shares respectively.

The commercial and services sector moved 3.5 million shares in total, with Kenya Airways touching a high of 0.04 dollars on a volume of 1.4 million shares.

During the week, the NSE 20 Share Index shaved off 36.84 points to settle at 3,890.85 points Friday while the All Share Index shed 0.03 points to stand at 146.74 points and the NSE 25 Share Index was down 10.76 points to settle at 4,216.20 points.

The bond market registered a decline in activity, with bonds totaling 630 million dollars transacted, down from 910 million dollars the previous week. Endit