The Ghana Stock Exchange (GSE) is in advance preparation stage to accept two new companies onto the local bourse to advance the course of the exchange and to help these two companies raise capital to help their operations.
Meanwhile, Joseph Cudjoe, Minister for Public Enterprises, disclosed that once his outfit has gotten the approval from cabinet to be listed, the rest of the processes will be much easier because the GSE has laid down the process already.
The two companies under consideration to be enlisted are the Tema Development Company (TDC) and Ghana Reinsurance Company (GhanaRe).
Mr. Joseph Cudjoe while announcing the liquidation of some 17 defunct state enterprises, hinted that his Ministry was pushing to get enterprises that were deemed profitable on the stock exchange. This move will boost operation of state enterprises which have been relying on the government for everything over the years, yet hardly make profits.
The sector Minister iterated that proposals are before cabinet for the two companies, TDC and Ghana Reinsurance to be listed.
“I have proposed some companies, at the moment two of them in cabinet, who have met the listing requirement. One in the real estate sector to help raise capital to deliver more housing and the other in the insurance industry to raise additional capital. It can be TDC and for the insurance sector, Ghana Re Insurance proposed.
“There are a lot of considerations that go into that decision at the cabinet level. Government hasn’t taken that decision but personally I am praying for it to happen.”
Mr. Joseph Cudjoe
Meanwhile, Financial Advisory Partner with Deloitte Africa, Yaw Appiah-Lartey has advised the government to tread with caution with any move in listing State-Owned Enterprises on the Stock Market.
Yaw Appiah-Lartey warned that the stock market has not had a good performance in the past years, hence the need to assess the market and list stocks that investors would be readily interested in purchasing.
Composite Index Records a Dip
Meanwhile, at the recent trading session, the composite index recorded a dip as the financial stocks index maintained positive momentum to close the day.
The Ghanaian equity market hit a snag as the Composite Index (GSE-CI) encountered a problem at the end of Thursday’s trading session. The index experienced a slight decline due to a drop in MTNGH’s share price, offsetting the share price gains made by UNIL, SOGEGH, and FML. In the end, the index closed with a loss of 14.70 points (0.47%), settling at 3,084.79 points with a year-to-date return of 26.22%.
Conversely, the Financial Stocks Index (GSE-FSI) continued its good run as the share price gains made from SOGEGH stocks marginally pushed the index forward by 11.08 (0.63%) points to end the day at 1,756.12 points with 14.44% YTD loss.
In the aggregate, 16 GSE listed equities participated in trading, ending with two gainers and one loser. The two gainers were Standard Chartered Bank (+9.97%) and Societe Generale Ghana (+9.9%).
At the end of Thursday’s trading session on the Ghana Stock Exchange, a total of 129,663 shares, corresponding to a market value of GHS 195,923.31, were traded. Compared with the previous GSE trading day (Tuesday, August 29), Thursday’s data showed 16% improvement in volume and 20% improvement in turnover.
