GSE now 2nd best performing stock market in Africa; Lusaka Stock Exchange is 1st

The Ghana Stock Exchange which led the league of African stock exchanges as the best performing market in the first half of this year in dollar term, was beaten to the first position by the Lusaka Stock Exchange in the first nine months of this year.

The impressive run by the Zambian kwacha against the dollar was the key contributing factor to the Accra Bourse being pushed to the second position.

In local currency term, the Accra Bourse was the best performing market on the African continent.

But the 1.78% depreciation of the cedi to the dollar and the 27 percentage point’s gain in the Zambian currency to the dollar pushed the GSE to the second position.

Whilst the GSE recorded about 44.55% gain in dollar term for investors at the end of September 2021, the Lusaka Stock Exchange registered 58%.

The 44% return for investors was however better than the 36% achieved in the first half of this year.

At the end of third quarter 2021, the market capitalization stood at ¢64.2 billion.

Until July 2021, the market was the number one on the African continent in performance in dollar term. Indeed, the cedi’s relative stable performance have compelled many investors to invest in the equity market.

According to the trading results, 15 stocks on both the main and SME Market registered gains in their market value, whilst six stock recorded losses.

The best performing stock was Fanmilk, and was followed by Societe Generale and MTN Ghana. However, the worst performing stock was Cocoa Processing Company which is selling at GHp2 per share. On the continent, the worst performing market is the Nigerian Stock Exchange with an annual return of -7.60%.

COUNTRY	STOCK EXCHANGE	RETURN
Zambia Ghana	LUSE ASI GSE-CI	58.98 44.55%
Malawi	MASI	21.24%
Cote d’Ivoire	BVRM CI	20.53%
Uganda	USE ASI	16.69%
Kenya	NSE ASI	15.82%
Morocco	MASI	15.32%
Namibia	NSX 01	12.96%

Source: Myjoyonline