Blue chips lose at bourse as foreign investors sell

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Analysts had cautioned that a vote to exit the EU by Britain would see short-term foreign capital flows out of frontier markets such as the NSE, which would hurt large cap counters that are heavily patronised by foreign traders.

Safaricom led blue chips in closing the week in the red as foreign investors sold shares on Friday, dragging the NSE’s main index down by 2.08 per cent.

The top 10 counters in the market all closed the week lower as a result, with the biggest decline in the group coming from the NSE’s biggest firm Safaricom which closed 6.7 per cent down at Sh17.45 a share.

The NSE 20 share index was as a result dragged down by 78 points to close the week at 3,706 points, with half of the decline (38 points) coming on Friday.

“Safaricom’s share price has been on the receiving end of sell-off pressure by investors, partly due to profit taking after hitting all-time highs of Sh18.50- Sh19 in the past week and the fact that quarter two is coming to an end and investors need to realise gains,” said ABC Capital in a market note on Friday.

EABL was down 4.3 per cent to Sh287, while Equity Holdings shed 3.8 per cent during the week to close at Sh38.50 on Friday.

Analysts had cautioned that a vote to exit the EU by Britain would see short-term foreign capital flows out of frontier markets such as the NSE, which would hurt large cap counters that are heavily patronised by foreign traders.

On the other end, Ugandan power firm Umeme led the market with a gain of 8.3 per cent to close at Sh18.95, followed by Kenya Airways at 7.7 per cent to Sh4.20 and National Bank at 5.5 per cent to close at Sh10.55.