Safaricom trades Sh1bn shares, recovers from sharp decline

Money Markets

Safaricom headquarters in Nairobi. FILE  Nation Media Group

By GEORGE NGIGI

In Summary

• Insurance firm Britam touched a three-year low after it traded at Sh10 a unit, which are levels last seen in October 2013. The insurer traded 6,696,100 shares.

Safaricom yesterday traded stocks worth Sh1 billion at the Nairobi Securities Exchange as its share continued recovering from the sharp drop on Monday.

The telco traded 57,665,600 units at an average Sh19 each, up from Sh18.85 in the previous trading session.

Safaricom share price dropped 7.5 per cent on Monday after it went ex-dividend but recovered to record a 2.4 per cent gain on Tuesday and 0.8 per cent yesterday.

“Up 16.6 per cent year to date, Safaricom is among the few counters that boasts of positive returns,” said Standard Investment Bank in an investor briefing.

Insurance firm Britam touched a three-year low after it traded at Sh10 a unit, which are levels last seen in October 2013. The insurer traded 6,696,100 shares.

Investors have been exiting the insurance counters as the factor unrealised losses likely to hit the insurers owing to their exposure in the stock market which has taken a dip.

Higher claims

Liberty Insurance, which released its results on Monday, was among the top losers’ for a third session in a row on local retail investor selling down 7.7 per cent to trade at Sh13.20.

READ: Safaricom dividend plan spurs foreign inflows at NSE

The insurer reported a 15.3 per cent drop in net profit in the half year ended June, weighed down by higher claims and operating expenses.
Bulk trades from Equity Bank and East African Breweries pushed the market turnover to Sh1.9 billion.

Equity Bank share price remained flat at Sh26 each as it traded 13,298,900 shares worth Sh347 million.

Banking stocks had mixed movements with five gaining and four losing.

Investors looked to have shrugged off an erroneous social media posting by Central Bank of Kenya saying banks were expected to apply the lower Kenya Banks Reference Rate as the base rate in the pricing of loans, which would have resulted in further lowering of interest margins.