Safaricom pulls foreign investors, lifting Nairobi bourse turnover

Equity turnover at the Nairobi Securities Exchange (NSE) rose to 13 million U.S. dollars on a volume of 73 million shares from the previous session's 7.9 million worth 1.4 million dollars, boosted by foreign investors trading of Safaricom.

The leading telecom moved a record 42 million shares at an unchanged price of 0.20 dollars. Monday, Safaricom traded 2.1 million shares as foreign investors kept off trading.

Electricity generator KenGen was the second best traded stock after moving 10 million shares at a high of 0.06 dollars.

Kenya Commercial Bank came third with 7.7 million shares that traded at 0.36 dollars, an increase of 3 percent.

At number four was Kenya Power with 4.4 million shares while Mumias Sugar closed the list of the top traded stocks with 3.3 million shares.

Most of the large stocks, however, went down or remained flat therefore pulling down the NSE 20 Share Index. Standard Chartered Bank, Centum Investment and East African Breweries are some of the top 20 stocks that declined.

The index declined 8.11 points Tuesday to end the day at 3,221.19 down from 3,229.30 in the previous session. Monday, the index dropped 15 points from a high of 3,244.72. Endit