Foreign inflows lift Nairobi bourse trading up 25 pct

Trading at the Nairobi Securities Exchange (NSE) rose 25 percent Tuesday to 4.1 million U.S. dollars on a volume of 19.3 million shares from 15.3 million valued at 3.3 million dollars Monday as foreign investors bought more than they sold.

The investors, who account for 80 percent of the trading at the bourse, mainly bought Liberty Holdings (insurance company) shares and Safaricom, which will announce its half-year financial results this Friday.

The insurance company moved the most shares, 8 million at 0.14 U.S. dollars after going up 3.9 percent.

On the other hand, Safaricom's inflows stood at 4.1 million shares traded at a new high of 0.21 dollars, a rise of 2.3 percent.

Investors, analysts say, are buying the share as they position themselves ahead of the announcing of the financial results.

Foreign investors accounted for 79 percent of total buying as compared to 44 percent of total selling.

Investment firm ICDC was the third top mover with 2.7 million shares, mainly foreign sales, at 0.40 dollars, a surge of 2.5 percent.

Kenya Airways, which had recorded huge gains last week thanks to local investors, lost 0.7 percent to stand at 0.06 dollars, and moved 1.3 million shares, mainly buys.

Kenya Commercial Bank closed the day's list of top five best stocks as it transacted 1 million shares, the highest outflows, at 0.27 dollars.

The NSE 20 share index edged down 1.98 points to 3,227.24 while the All Share Index (NASI) increased by 0.9 percent to 138.31. Endit