Ghana stocks were adrift on Thursday, December 2, 2021 with Cal Bank posting losses at the end of an uninspired trading session, as total transactions on the local bourse declined appreciably.

Cal Bank stocks experienced a Black Wednesday of its own, suffering its worst daily loss of 2.3 percent in almost three months.

In the midst of the forgoing, experts attributed the latest bearish performance of the GSE to the global concerns over the new coronavirus variant from Southern Africa, while other analysts suggested buyback pressure as a factor.

In total, thirteen (13) GSE equities participated in trading, ending with one loser, namely CAL Bank, with 2.3 percent share price depreciation, while twelve (12) remained unchanged.

CAL closed its trading day (Thursday, December 2, 2021) at GH¢0.85 per share on the Ghana Stock Exchange (GSE). Sell-off among Cal Bank investors persisted while the stocks headed lower on the day, recording a loss of GH¢0.02 from its previous closing price of GH¢0.87. However, CAL Bank began the year with a share price of GH¢0.69 and has since gained 23.2 percent on that price valuation, ranking it 11th on the GSE in terms of year-to-date performance.

In spite of Thursday’s loss, investors can be expectant about CAL, knowing the stock has accrued 9 percent over the past four-week period- fourth best on GSE.

CAL Bank is the second most traded stock, following MTN Ghana on the Ghana Stock Exchange over the past three months (Sep 6 – Dec 2, 2021). CAL Bank has traded a total volume of 12.2 million shares valued at GHS 9.36 million over the period, with an average of 194,440 traded shares per session. A volume high of 3.93 million was achieved on October 1, 2021 for the same period.

Total Transactions Decline

At the end of Thursday’s trading session on the Ghana Stock Exchange (GSE), a total of 52,175 shares, corresponding to a market value of GHS 123,964.77, were traded. Compared with the previous GSE trading day (Wednesday, December 1), Thursday’s data showed 14 percent decline in volume but 37 percent improvement in turnover.

CAL Bank recorded the highest volume of 18,026 traded shares. This was followed by MTN Ghana with 14,402 traded shares. Ecobank Ghana also secured 6,062 traded shares and Ghana Oil Company completed the list with 5,497 volume of hares traded on Thursday’s trading session.

Market Indices

With regards to the performance of GSE market indices, the benchmark GSE Composite Index (GSE-CI) pared 1.2 (-0.04%) points to close at 2,842.07 points, representing a week on week loss of 0.62 percent, and a month on month loss of 2.99 percent. Nonetheless, the composite index recorded an overall year-to-date gain of 46.38 percent.

On the other hand, the GSE Financial Stocks Index (GSE-FSI) decreased by 0.1 percent to settle at 2,089.21 points, making it a 1-week gain of 0.52 percent, a 4-week gain of 0.49 percent, and a year-to-date gain of 17.19 percent.

The current market capitalization of the Ghana Stock Exchange is GH¢ 64.2 billion.