The Nairobi All Share rallied 0.44 points to close at 146.87 and just below a 2016 high reached on March 3. The Nairobi NSE20 firmed +4.92 points to close at 3939.50 Equity turnover clocked 775.438 million.
The big news was around Kenya Commercial Bank and Chase Bank.
Safaricom rallied +0.86 per cent to score another fresh closing high of Sh17.50.
Safaricom had lift-off at the closing bell when it was trading session highs of 17.85 +3.18 per cent. Safaricom traded 5.16 million shares and there were five buyers for every seller at the finish. This is a chart break-out right here. Safaricom is +7.36 per cent this year and all set to sprint higher ahead of the release of its full year earnings.
Kenya Airways firmed +1.14 per cent to close at Sh4.40 and was trading at 4.50, +3.45 per cent at the finish. KQ’s chief executive reached out to the media last week and struck a confident tone. The share price has held the line here for a few weeks, and I think it will take little to take us up to Sh5.00 and a little beyond.
The big news yesterday morning is that KCB Group is set to acquire a majority stake (“will conduct a detailed due diligence before acquiring the majority stake in Chase Bank”) . Chase Bank, which will now reopen on Wednesday.
The KCB chief executive Joshua Oigara might be better termed the ‘consolidator in chief’ and is having KCB play a catalytic role at this important juncture of consolidation. “The regulator has today (yesterday) reached understandings with the KCB Bank Kenya Ltd on modalities to reopen Chase Bank Ltd in the next few days and the eventual acquisition of a majority stake in the bank,” said the CBK in a statement.
Kenya Commercial Bank rallied +0.59 per cent to close at Sh42.75, a fresh 2016 closing high and on good ticket size of 3.026 million shares worth Sh129.874 million. Buyers outpaced sellers by a factor of five to one at the finale signalling that the price is set to make upside headway. KCB is sitting in pole position, its able to drive a hard bargain in this whole process of consolidation and most importantly it is also acting in the national interest. It marks a coming of age of the bank.
Equity was heavily traded with 9.953 million shares changing hands. Equity closed unchanged at Sh39.00. KenGen pushed +1.25 per cent better to close at Sh8.10 and was trading at 8.25, +3.13 per cent at the finish. KenGen is now +14.084 per cent this year and has plenty of upside scope.
Aly Khan Satchu is a financial analyst