Nairobi bourse key index, turnover fall on low foreigners' input

The Nairobi Securities Exchange (NSE) 20 Share Index took a negative turn Thursday, losing 5.93 points to close the day at 3,122.51.

The index has been on a rally since Monday rising to hit a new high of 3,128.44 Wednesday boosted by rise in bank stocks, namely Kenya Commercial Bank, Equity Bank and I&M Bank.

But Thursday, drop in prices of various large stocks including Safaricom, British America Tobacco and Standard Chartered Bank pushed down the index.

Turnover, similarly, declined 65 percent to 1.8 million dollars on a volume of 11 million shares from the previous session's 26 million valued at 5 million dollars pushed down by foreign investors' low participation.

Their participation stood at 57.3 percent down from 60 percent, accounting for 50 percent of total buying and 65 percent of total selling.

Electricity-generator Kengen was the top traded stock after moving 3.1 million shares at a fairly stable price of 0.06 dollars.

Kengen was followed by KenolKobil, another firm in the energy sector, which actively moved 2.2 million shares at 0.12 dollars.

Safaricom, Equity Bank and Athi River Mining closed the list of the top five traded stocks but did not exchange more than a million shares. Safaricom traded 997,100, Equity Bank 762,400 and Athi River Mining 512,200.

The bond market witnessed reduced activity with bonds worth 29 million dollars transacted compared to 45 million registered the previous session. Endit