The Uganda Securities Exchange experienced a decline in trading volume in the third week of the year, although the value of shares traded by local listed companies increased.
The volume of shares traded fell to 3,929,059 from 5,251,248 last week, while the number of active counters also fell by one to seven. The value of transactions, however, increased to Shs437mn ($114,697) from Shs266.2mn last week.
MTN Uganda was the most active company with a volume of 1,552,971 shares traded; it was also the only counter to record activity on all five trading days. The second most traded company was Bank of Baroda Uganda with 1,102,900 shares, followed by Stanbic Holdings Uganda Limited with 924,750 shares, and Umeme Limited with 299,650 shares. Cipla Quality Chemicals Limited sold 31,713 shares, Airtel Uganda sold 12,775 shares, while Dfcu sold 4,300 shares.
As was the case last week, British American Tobacco Uganda, Cipla Quality Chemicals Limited, and National Insurance Corporation did not trade this week, nor did New Vision Limited.
MTN had the highest value of shares transacted at Shs267.2mn, followed by Umeme Limited at Shs119.9mn. Stanbic Holdings Uganda came in third with Shs29.6mn, followed by Bank of Baroda Uganda at Shs16.5mn, Cipla Quality Chemicals at Shs1.7mn, and Airtel Uganda at Shs1.2mn. Dfcu had a trading value of Shs967,500.
Stanbic Holdings experienced the highest increase in its stock price, rising by 2.5 per cent to close at Shs32.8. In contrast, Airtel Uganda’s share price closed the week down 1.8 per cent at Shs92, while MTN Uganda’s price dropped 1 per cent to Shs170.24 at the end of the week.
($1 = Shs3,810.2 on Friday 19 January)
