Stocks Watch – 11 July 2012

At today’s NSE trading, we will be closely observing the following share counters:

• Carbacid Investments Ltd – The parent company of Carbacid (CO2) Ltd rallied on Friday to reach its highest price in more than one and a half years. The share gained 8 percent to close at Ksh 130 up from Ksh 120 on Thursday. The share has been on an upward trend this year having gained 51 percent since early January which represents an addition of Ksh 43.87 on the share’s price (Bloomberg).
• Kengen – After hitting this year’s highest price of Ksh 8.95 for a second time in late June, the share of Kenya’s leading power generating company has been on an overall decline, losing a total of 5.6 percent since then to close at Friday’s price of Ksh 8.45. The company is among the world’s top 10 geothermal producers and is currently building the world’s single largest geothermal power plant set to be complete by the year 2014 according to last year’s Annual Report.
• Total Kenya Ltd – In this month’s fuel price review, the Energy Regulatory Commission (ERC) has reduced the maximum price of super petrol and diesel by a big margin of 8 percent (Reuters) which could affect Total’s earnings. Last year, the company made a net loss of Ksh 71 million compared to a profit of Ksh 916 million in 2010 owing to increased production costs which the company was not able to pass on to customers  because of the ERC’s price regulation mechanism according to last year’s Annual Report. The share closed Friday’s trading down 0.32 percent at Ksh 15.45 down from Ksh 15.50 yesterday.