Kenya Commercial Bank (KCB) moved the largest volume of shares at the Nairobi Securities Exchange (NSE) for the second trading session in a row, following its announcement of intention to purchase the stock of fellow lender National Bank of Kenya.
Coming through the Easter weekend, KCB moved 6.9 million shares, adding on to the 4 million shares it had transacted during the previous session.
Its market activity on the opening day of trading at the bourse for the week starting April 23 stood at Ksh314 million.
However, its share price dipped by 5cents as compared against Thursday’s trading session, ending the day at Ksh44.95.
The Maundy Thursday announcement by KCB of its intention to purchase 100% of the NBK stock on a share swap deal had also seen National Bank’s stock spike highest at the bourse, at 7.29%.
NBK’s stock jumped further in Tuesday’s trading, moving upwards of 9.55% to register at Ksh5.16 at closing bell.
The market activity shows that investors are cautiously following the KCB-NBK share swap deal.
Elsewhere at the bourse, equity turnover stood at Ksh530 million, ticking up from the Ksh429 million posted on Thursday.
The bond market meanwhile had bonds worth Ksh2 billion transacted.
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The indices counter endured mixed activity, as the NSE 20 Share index fell 4.52 points to stand at 2865.60, while the All Share Index and the NSE 25 Share Index both spiked.
At a 0.36 points upsurge, the All Share Index settled at 158.65 while the NSE 25 Share Index gained 5.88 points to stand at 3963.95.
The Banking Sector moved shares worth Ksh372 million, accounting for 70.23% of the day’s traded value.
Regular big hitters Safaricom had shares valued at Ksh119 million at between Ksh27.65 and Ksh28.00, representing 22.59% of the day’s traded value.
NSE gainers, decliners and top volume movers
Beating NBK to the day’s largest rise in stock price was Uchumi, who at Ksh0.44 registered a 10% rise.
Kapchorua Tea, at Ksh65.50 per share, steamed 9.17% while Sameer Africa stood at a 9% bump to end trading at Ksh2.18.
On the decliners tab, Stanlib Fahari I-Reit dipped 8.02% to settle at Ksh8.94.
The impressive performance of banks was not enough to stop two lenders, NIC Group and HF Group, from plunging into the red zone. Shedding 7.34% and 6.21% respectively, NIC and HF ended bourse trading at Ksh34.10 and Ksh4.08 respectively.
After KCB and Safaricom, Equity Group also breached the million shares mark, moving 1.02 million stock at the NSE.
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