Nairobi Securities Exchange shaken by political anxiety

After #GitheriMan (who has now been found by the way) took over social media and aided in breaking the ice just after Kenyans voted, tension slowly thawed towards Wednesday morning when Presidential results recorded very little change, evidently projecting President to be.

However, stocks did not share the same sentiment in trends. Turnover collapsed to Sh166.6 million as most businesses remained closed due to uncertainty of the final election result. Investors also largely kept away from the market.

As cities across the country remained deserted, most clients are said to have chosen to see what unfolds in the helm of the announcement and post-announcement. Buying and selling was at a stall despite expectations that Wednesday would be a normal day for business.

Trades

According to a reliable daily and by extension NSE, market data showed only 7.8 million shares were traded across all 62 counters, compared to 10.4 million on Monday and 29.3 million last Friday. Turnover had stood at Sh302 million on Monday, down from Sh848 million on Friday.

The number of deals also fell to 638, from 1,097 on Monday.

The NSE traded an average turnover of Sh1 billion per day in July, indicating just how much the political tension has spooked investors, prompting them to hold on as they wait to see what direction the country will take.

Safaricom and #ticker:SCOM dominated Wednesday’s training accounting for 32 per cent of turnover having moved 2:21 million shares at sh23.75 which was 25 cents higher than Monday’s sh23:50

This shows the trend started getting better after stocks recorded price gains. The stock market has been on the upward trajectory since March, pushing the main NSE 20 share index to trade at one-year high of 3850 points.

Secondary bonds market recorded a sh306 million turnover from 684 million on Monday. The markets were stable until ODM leader Raila Odinga claimed that the IEBC database had been hacked therefore manipulating provisional results.

The shilling however strengthened against the dollar to an average of 103.80 from Monday’s 103.88 average.

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