The Nairobi Securities Exchange (NSE) on Thursday recorded the highest turnover in the year posting a 583 per cent increase to Sh3.76 billion.
This is up from Sh550 million recorded in the previous trading session.
The positive performance was driven by growing foreign investors demand for listed equities in the Kenyan market.
The number of shares traded increased to 123.6 million up from 17 million shares traded the previous day.
The value of shares bought by foreign investor settled at Sh 3.4 billion, a 572 per cent increase from the value traded on Wednesday.
“We traded a total volume of 3.752 billion, a recent record high,” chairman Kiprono Kittony announced.
The impressive performance comes on the back of improving performance in the equities market evidenced by an 11.3 per cent growth in equities turnover - year to date to Sh116 billion from Sh 104 billion recorded over a similar period last year.
Equally, the bond market has continued to depict resilience recording a turnover of Sh495 billion, despite being a 5.7 per cent drop compared to a similar period last year, with the Covid-19 pandemic being a major hurdle in the markets globally.
The strong performance is despite the country’s three negative sovereign ratings by global rating agencies in 2020.
NSE chief executive Geoffrey Odundo said: “Today’s performance is a testament of improving investor sentiments as listed securities in our market continue to show impressive recovery”.
Safaricom was the day’s main feature with 115 million shares valued at Sh3.4 billion, changing hands at between Sh29.50 and Sh30.15, accounting for 92.3 per cent of the day’s traded value.
The banking sector had shares worth Sh136 million transacted which accounted for 3.64 per cent of the day’s traded value.
Equity Group Holdings was the most actively traded counter in this sector with 2.7 million shares valued at Sh100 million changing hands at between Sh36.00 and Sh37.00.
KCB Group remained steady at Sh37.55 with shares worth Sh21.6 million transacted.
NCBA Group down 1.58 per cent to Sh.21.80 moved 146,000 shares valued at Sh3.1 million.
The construction and allied sector had shares worth Sh10.7 million traded, insurance sector (2.6 million shares) , investment sector (Sh2.2 million), while manufacturing and allied had 130 million worth of shares traded.
The bond market had bonds worth Sh1.5 billion transacted.
