nairobi

The Nairobi Securities Exchange (NSE) had a slow start Monday as some 28 million shares valued at $7.9 million were transacted down from 35 million shares worth $11 million posted last Friday. Safaricom, Kenya’s leading telecom, moved 13 million shares at unchanged price of $0.24 to end the session as the top traded stock. The telecom had moved 7.4 million session in the previous session. Cooperative Bank came second with 5.5 million shares at 0.15 dollars, a rise of 1.6 per cent while Kenya Commercial Bank followed with 2.3 million shares traded at $0.40, a drop of 0.6 per cent.

Electricity generator KenGen was fourth during the trading session after moving 1.4 million shares at 0.08 dollars, an increase of 3.7 per cent. Equity Bank closed the list of the top traded stock after moving 1.1 million shares at 0.40 dollars, a marginal decline.

NSE 20 Share Index dropped 1.1 points to close at 3,798.63 from 3,797.53 as several large stocks went down marginally while the NSE All Share Index (NASI) was down to close at 160.01 points. Top gainers included Scangroup, Umeme and I&M Bank which gained 9.2 per cent, 9 per cent and 6 per cent respectively while losers were led by troubled supermarket Uchumi, lost 9 per cent.

Xinhua.