Africa investor Ai40 Weekly Commentary –18 March 2013

The Ai40 Index continues its slow slide downwards, and dropped this week by 1.4%. The Index currently stands at a value of 113.12.

US markets were all in the red this week as their three largest indexes saw negative closes. This fall ended the Dow Jones industrial Average’s best winning streak in over 17 years, and trading this week was done without confidence. Investors fear that rising inflation will cause the Federal Reserve to retreat from policies aimed at boosting markets.

The S&P500, which is anticipated to reach a value of 1,600, closed the week at a value of 1,560 having posted losses this week of 2.53 points, or 0.16%, followed by the Dow Jones Industrial Average, which tumbled by 0.16%, losing 25.03 points to close the week at a value of 3,249,07. The worst performing of the lot was the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite with a fall of 0.30%, or 9.86 points.

Gainers

This week’s winners hail from various parts of the continent; but our highest gainer this week is from North Africa – finally seeing a positive change after making up a good portion of the losers’ list in weeks past. Banque Marocaine du Commerce saw a very impressive gain of 15.0%.

Two gainers came from East Africa this week with Kenyan stocks continuing their winning streak. Safaricom posted gains of 4.1% and East African Breweries made a return to our list of gainers by jumping 3.6%. Rounding off the gainers, Mauritius Commercial Bank increased its share price this week by 2.6% and Guinness Nigeria PLC gained by 3.7%.

Losers

Togo’s Ecobank, which has been the biggest gainer for two weeks running, has seen a change in their luck, posting losses of 7.2%. Barclays Bank Kenya, which was also one of our gainers last week, saw their price tumble by 4.6%.

South African Telecommunications giant MTN Group joins this week’s losers having posted losses of 3.7% and, also from South Africa, from the banking sector, Standard Bank dropped this week by 4.4%. The biggest loser this week was Egypt’s Orascom Construction, which fell this week by 8.4%

For more on the Ai40 Index, please visit the Africa investor website at www.africainvestor.com.