Nairobi bourse turnover drops 15 pct on low foreign trading

Some 29 million shares valued at 6.6 million U.S. dollars were traded Thursday at the Nairobi Securities Exchange (NSE) as turnover went down 15 percent, with foreign inflows and outflows declining.

The bourse had registered 49 million shares valued at 7.7 million dollars Wednesday.

Equity Bank, Safaricom, KenolKobil, Kenya Commercial Bank (KCB) and Nation Media Group attracted the most foreign buys and sales.

Overall, KenolKobil was the top mover for the second trading session, with 9.3 million shares traded at 0.10 dollars to account for 32 percent of the day's traded volume.

Leading telecom operator Safaricom, on the other hand, was the second best mover after the firm's 8.6 million shares changed hands at a high of 0.19 dollars.

The banking sector had 9.9 million shares traded to represent 34 percent of the day's traded volume.

Equity Bank actively moved 6.4 million shares at a high of 0.39 dollars while KCB Group moved 2.3 million shares.

In the commercial and services sector, some 641,000 shares were traded, with Scangroup moving up slightly to 0.15 dollars to trade 277,000 shares after touching a 12-month low.

The NSE 20 Share Index continued to tumble, going down 7.1 points Thursday to stand at 3,468.29 while the All Share Index (NASI) edged 0.51 points higher to stand at 141.94.

At the bonds market, securities worth 13 million dollars were transacted from 19 million dollars Wednesday. Endit