Kenya's bourse registers lowest trading since January

Nairobi Securities Exchange (NSE) equities market Monday recorded the lowest trading day since the start of the year as turnover plunged to 1.7 million U.S. dollars on a volume of 6.3 million shares.

The lowest the bourse had dropped since January was 1.8 million dollars from 8.7 million shares on May 26.

The Monday trading went down from 13 million shares valued at 2.9 million dollars posted last Friday as investors kept off the market due to decline in prices of key stocks, including that of leading telecom Safaricom.

The declined trading saw the NSE 20 Share Index shed 42 points to settle at a new low of 3,555.18.

The All Share Index, similarly, declined 0.94 points to settle at 137.36 while the NSE 25 Share Index was down 30.35 points to stand at 3,856.59.

Safaricom, in the telecommunication sector, was the top day's trader moving 1.6 million shares at a low of 0.17 dollars.

The banking sector, on other hand, traded 1.1 million shares with Cooperative Bank falling marginally to 0.15 dollars to move 717,000 shares while Kenya Commercial Bank Group moved 172,000 shares to close at 0.32 dollars.

The energy and petroleum sector moved 1.4 million shares, with KenolKobil actively moving 1 million of the total at 0.10 dollars.

The manufacturing and allied sector traded 605,000 shares, with East African Breweries dropping to 2.5 dollars to move 263,000 shares.

At the bonds market, trading similarly dropped to 8.2 million from 11 million last Friday. Endit