The Kenyan money market fund continues to improve and offer its investors handsome returns in a rather tight financial environment. Since last year, MMF rates have been on a consistent upward trend.
The growth in MMF has largely been attributed to the increase in citizen awareness and financial inclusion efforts by all relevant stakeholders.
MMF fund managers who invest client money in indices traded at the Nairobi Securities Exchange have noted that Kenya’s capital market started the year on a high note. Both treasury bills and bonds had the highest returns in the first week of February.
A report from the CBK shows that NSE investors gained a cumulative total of Sh. 24 billion in value at the end of last week. The market capitalisation for all NSE-listed companies rose to Sh. 2.04 trillion, up from Sh. 2.018 trillion in the previous week.
The number of shares traded increased by 62.5%, from Sh. 117.4 million to Sh. 190.83 million. This large increase pushed the total equity turnover by nearly 50%. Major stock market indices reported increases; NASI went up by 1.2%, NSE 25 by 0.5% and NSE 20 rose by 0.3%.
East Africa Portland Cement were the biggest gainers last week, closing with a 9.34% increase. It is expected that Kenyan investors will be eyeing their sights for the hot stock, even as the company gears to its first dividend payment in 13 years.
The company confirmed that it would be selling some of its assets to fund the dividend payments. Other companies that did well include Centum Investment, Home Afrika and Uchumi.
CBK to slap banks keeping cost of loans high with daily fines
Despite this, market analysts believe banking stocks will perform even better this year as they continue preparations to release their end-of-financial-year results in March.
Treasury bill rates have been on a downward trend. Nonetheless, the number of bids surged to a record high right after the CBK announced that they were slashing the base lending rates by 50 basis points to 10.75%.
CBK had advertised bids for Sh. 24 billion and investors submitted bids totalling Sh. 71.2 billion.
