Lukewarm third quarter on BSE
Staff Writer | Friday November 7, 2014 13:56
There were about 126.1million shares worth P551.7 million that exchanged hands during the third quarter as compared to 125.8 million shares, which were valued at P394.4 million during the second quarter.
According to a market report from Motswedi Securities, the higher turnover against flat volumes reflects the trading of highly priced counters such as Sechaba, BIHL and Stanchart as they were among the top 10 most traded counters.
“This resulted on market average Price to earnings escalating to multiples of 14x from 12.8x,” stated the report.
According to Motswedi, Letshego saw its liquidity becoming stronger and stronger in the period as it traded the largest volumes for a 3rd consecutive quarter. This was also reflected by the huge gap between the micro lender’s volumes and the other top traded counters.
“Letshego traded about 39 percent while FNBB and Turnstar contributed 23.2 percent and 12.8 percent respectively. The retail counters were among the most traded on positive investors’ sentiments following the company’s recent expansion strategies outside Botswana,” added the report.
The major movers during the quarter were not from any particular industry, with mixed gains from different sectors with the tourism companies among the top gainers.
While volumes were flat, the mainstream Domestic Companies Index (DCI) during the quarter was on an uptrend though for the last month it was almost flat, losing just a basis point while it gained 1.4 percent and 1.9 percent during the last 2 months of the quarter.
In the period, G4S was the largest gainer during the quarter following its half-year results where Profit After tax rebounded, escalating by 129 percent year on year though its revenues grew marginally by 7 percent.
The security firm surged by 57 percent during the third quarter extending its year to date gains to 27 percent.
Imara was also on the positive territory as market responded to their full year results where the financial service company managed to post a profit of P16.1million as compared to a loss of P1.5 million during the prior financial year.
Despite concerns about the outlook of Sechaba, the brewery counter pocketed a huge 16 percent during the quarter. Sechaba still remain under cautionary which stated that the company’s board is still assessing the full impact of certain corporate change proposals that if embarked upon and successfully implemented, may have an effect on its share price.