Banks, telecom shares boost Nairobi bourse trading

Turnover at the Nairobi Securities Exchange (NSE) rose to 5.7 million U.S. dollars Tuesday, the first trading session this week after a public holiday, on a volume of 23 million shares from the previous session's 8.9 million worth 1.1 million dollars last Friday.

The over 400 percent rise in turnover was due to increased buying and selling of telecommunication and banking sector shares by foreign investors, whose participation at the market stood at 83 percent.

Safaricom, Kenya's leading telecom, moved 8 million shares at a declined price of 0.18 dollars. On the other hand, Equity Bank, Cooperative Bank and Kenya Commercial Bank (KCB) were the second, third and fourth day's top movers.

Equity Bank actively moved 4.5 million shares at 0.30 dollars while Cooperative Bank closed 2 percent higher to 0.13 dollars on a volume of 4.3 million shares.

KCB, on the other hand, went down some cents to 0.28 dollars and moved 2.3 million shares. In total, the banking sector traded 11 million shares representing 49 percent of the day's traded volume.

The commercial sector traded 1.6 million shares with Uchumi Supermarkets moving 1.5 million shares at 0.02 dollars.

The NSE 20 Share Index continued with its downward trend, losing 3.32 points to stand at 3,155.57, while the All Share Index (NASI) shed 0.38 points to settle at 131.87 and the NSE 25 Share Index was down 5.35 points to stand at 3,489.68. Endit