Ghana Stock Exchange makes impressive gains in 2017

The Ghana Stock Exchange made positive strides in 2017 with a surplus of GH¢12. 368 million for the year ending 31 December compared with GH¢5.377 for 2016.

The GSE Council Chairman, Mr Albert Essien told members that improvement in the macro-economic indicators positively affected the performance of the Exchange.

The Composite Index (GSE-CI), which measures the performance of the entire market, recovered from its negative trend in 2016 to end the year strongly with 52.73 per cent compared with the negative 15.33 per cent at the end of 2016.

Similarly, the GSE Financial Stock index (GSE-FI) also recorded a positive gain of 49.51 per cent compared to a negative 19.93 per cent in 2016.

Mr Essien said market capitalisation for all listed securities at the end of December 2017 was GH¢58.8 billion compared to GH¢52.7 billion in 2016, representing an increase of 11.48 per cent.

“Domestic market capitalisation also gained 45.23% ending December 2017 at GH¢16.2 billion compared to GH¢10.9 billion at the end of December 2016,” he said.

The Managing Director, Kofi Yamoah, says the GSE had stepped up the promotion of the markets to issuers and investors as well as advocacy for local content listings.

“We are working on further improving market efficiency, confidence and ultimately liquidity,” he said.

Mr Yamoah said the GSE was supporting the development of the market for repurchase agreements and operationalised a satellite office for running the Securities Courses in Kumasi.

The volume of shares traded within the review year was 323 million at a value of GH¢518million, compared to the GH¢242 million that was raised on 253 million shares in 2016.

Source: GNA