First an apology to regular readers - the usual feed of information from the Ghana Stock Exchange has not been coming, so this is the first update for a week. No explanation has been offered, though the computer system of at least one broker was recently infected with Happy99, and another has had a fire at its office - though investors are assured that their holdings are safe.
Monday's turnover was boosted by a large (540,400 shares) deal in SSB Ltd at 1650 cedis. This is below half of last year's peak of 3680, the decline setting in at 24th April last year. It has been very risky to call the turn in SSB's fortunes, particularly since the shares are down almost 27% since January, but in Monday's trading bidders exceeded sellers by 569,400 to 540,600.
The only price movement recorded was the slippage of 3 cedis by Pioneer Aluminium Factory to 345, though turnover was muted at 500 shares.
Last week saw a raft of company results and announcements. Enterprise Insurance Co, which was the subject of a takeover from Ventures & Acquisitions at the start of 1998, finally produced figures for 1998 reporting earnings per share of 372.75 cedis. This is about 30% up on the 1997 results of 286.45 cedis per share. EIC is a marine and general (non-life) insurance company, so these figures suggest that the Ghanaian economy has been quite bouyant in the past year. The shares were not traded on Monday, but have fallen to 2000 cedis (from 2010) since a week last Friday.
The company figures for Mobil Oil of Ghana Ltd suggest that the full year results to 31st March 1998 have been released, in succession to the half-year results to 30th June 1998. Unless the company has changed its year end - which is unlikely given its association with Mobil in the USA - the figures related to the year end to 31st December, and show a small increase in profits, from 2967.53 cedis per share to 3216.3 cedis this time. The dividend is up about 15% to 1173 cedis, from 1020 last time. The shares traded unchanged at 16,800 cedis on a parcel of 100.
Super Paper Products Co has disappointed with results showing earnings have collapsed from 45.38 cedis per share to 8.77. The company has passed its dividend. Certainly last year's accounts showed that the company was heavily dependent on credit from its equipment suppliers to continue trading - SPPC appears to have been badly affected by last year's power shortage, problems that would have been re-doubled since paper manufacture is heavily dependent on large quantities of water. The shares were not traded on Monday, but have drifted down 4 cedis in the past week to 240 cedis.
Unilever has announced its dividend, 173 cedis per share, up from 144 cedis last time. This represents almost 80% of earnings at 209.46 cedis per share. The Anglo-Dutch conglomerate, Unilever has received an unwelcome take-over bid.
The Exchange authorities announced various measures that they hope will boost the status of the Ghana Exchange - from August investing organisations such as pension schemes will be free to invest up to 30% of their funds in equities, increased from the current limit of 15%. Draft rules are being created to allow the creation of investment trusts and similar vehicles. Turnover has been dire this year, but what the market really needs is some of the long-promised IPOs, or flotations. It is now 18 months since this column was told by senior Stock Exchange personnel that State Insurance Company, National Investment Bank and Barclays Bank of Ghana would join the exchange "this year".
The "optimism index", of issues where bids exceed offers, higher at 5. Aggregate shares offered are down at 2.88m, with bids a little higher than of late at 1.18m.
No trades were recorded in the bond market.
