Ellerines de-lists from BSE

Brian Benza
Staff Writer | Tuesday January 29, 2008 00:00

A statement on the BSE website says Ellerines Holdings de-listed with effect from 24 January 2008. The company was founded in 1950 by South African brothers, Sidney and Eric Ellerines. It has been bought by ABIL for P8.57 billion.

The company ceased to be listed as a separate entity on the JSE at the beginning of last week.

Ellerines operates in the retail furniture and appliance sector trading out of 1,156 outlets. It operates in both the rural and urban areas across six countries in southern Africa namely South Africa, Botswana, Lesotho, Namibia, Swaziland and Zambia.

The company has more than 1,000 outlets with brand names including Town Talk, Beares, Geen and Richards, Lubners and Dial-a-Bed, Mattress Factory and Furniture City.

Ellerines' de-listing from BSE brought down the number of listed companies on the bourse to 29.

Meanwhile both indices traded weaker last week with big caps pulling down the DCI, while dual-listed counters dragged down the FCI in response to the global market trends.

The DCI lost 1.05 percent to close the week at 8316.70 points as the large caps Barclays and Stanchart lost 4.11 percent and 2.70 percent respectively. The biggest gainer for the week was Furnmart, which went up 5.43 percent, and the biggest loser was Investec, which went down 25.77 percent. As a result, the FCI went down by 0.57 percent closing the week at 2187.69 points. Dual listed financial concern Investec lost over a quarter of its value in the week. It was worst affected by the global markets turmoil which yesterday took off  from where it had left last week.

A BBC report said yesterday that European and Asian shares fell sharply as concerns continue about the threat of a recession in the US and its impact on the world economy.

The UK's main FTSE 100 index was down 108 points or 1.8 percent in morning trading in London, while Germany's Dax had lost 1.6 percent and France's Cac was down 2.5 percent. In Japan, the Nikkei 225 had earlier finished the day's trading down 4 percent.

Analysts say dealers are cautious ahead of an expected interest rate cut from the Federal Reserve tomorrow. Hong Kong's Hang Seng index closed yesterday down 4.3 percent, while Mumbai's Sensex was down 3.5 percent in afternoon exchanges. Monday's falls come after Friday's declines on Wall Street, with the Dow Jones index losing 171 points or 1.4 percent.