Kenya's bourse registers lowest trading since start of the year

Kenya's Nairobi Securities Exchange (NSE) on Monday recorded the lowest trading since the start of the year as turnover declined to 1 million U.S. dollars on a volume of 5.5 million shares.

Last Friday, the market closed at 9.9 million dollars on a volume of 36 million shares, with Monday's trading characterized by increased foreign sales amid decline in stock prices.

Foreign investors were net sellers accounting for 75.4 percent of total market sales and 73.6 percent of total market buys.

Safaricom was the day's biggest mover, transacting 3.7 million shares at unchanged price of 0.17 dollars. In the previous session, the leading telecom traded 21 million shares at the same price.

Save for Safaricom, all the other stocks that made it to the top five list, did not move more than 1 million shares.

Home Afrika, Barclays Bank, Equity Bank and Kenya Commercial Bank (KCB) traded a paltry 383,500, 239,300, 130,100 and 128,500 shares respectively. Equity Bank and KCB, however, registered price gains of 3.9 percent and 0.8 percent.

The NSE 20 Share Index slid further down to 2,955.44 points from 2,971.10, having fallen below the psychological 3,000 points in the last session.

The All Share Index ended the week higher at 124.27 points from 123.94 while NSE 25 Share index stood at 3,247.40 from 3,228.69. Endit