EGX Losses EGP 12 Bln, Benchmark Dives 4.61% On Tahrir Protests

During Wednesday closing session, the Egyptian Exchange (EGX) has posted severe losses of EGP 12 billion as the capital market has amounted to EGP 338.026 billion.

The EGX indices closed in dark red.

The main index, EGX30 dived by 4.61% to end at 4815.43 p. EGX20 sank by 4.21% to close at 5543.14 p.

Meanwhile, the mid- and small-cap index, the EGX70 pushed down by 425.6% to conclude at 425.6 p.  Price index EGX100 tumbled by 4.41% to finish at 710.1 p.

Traded volume reached 144.934 million securities worth EGP 430.100 million, exchanged 23.989 thousand transactions.

This was after trading in 172 listed securities; 156 declined, 7 advanced; while 9 keeping their previous levels.

EGX’s severe losses were driven by local and non-Arab Foreigners’ selling pressures as they were net sellers seizing 66.91% and 23.55% respectively, of the total market, with a net equity of EGP 1.984 million and EGP 23.742 million, excluding the deals.

On the other hand, Arabs were net buyers seizing 9.53% of the total markets, with a net equity of EGP 25.726 million excluding the deals.

The benchmark stock index surrendered its spot as the world’s best performer this year after renewed political unrest in the country triggered the worst drop since last year’s uprising.

EGX30, which tumbled the most on Sunday (Black Sunday) since the start of last year’s uprising, slid 3.9 percent to 4,726.04 at 10:37 a.m. in Cairo today, trimming this year’s gains to 31 percent. The measure lost the top spot to Pakistan’s Karachi 100 Index and fell to fifth place among 93 indexes tracked by Bloomberg. The Egyptian pound, subject to managed float, weakened 0.2 percent, the biggest intraday drop since December 2011, to 6.1042 a dollar.