The 2 banks under our watch yesterday did not yield much material movement despite release of their Q3 results. Each of the banks (Co-operative Bank and Standard Chartered) did not get much action in the course of the day. It is more sad than unfortunate really.

These results also came at a time when the Nairobi Securities Exchange (NSE) performance was wanting. Both the All-share and the 20-share indices closed lower at 92.26 points and 4147.94 points respectively. Since the banking sector will see all of the listed financial institutions announce their Q3 results in the course of the week, we will maintain our focus on the sector. For today, we shall look at Equity bank and Kenya Commercial Bank (KCB)

• Equity Bank – Having started off the year with lows around KES 15.80 and closing at KES 24.75 yesterday, the bank’s shareholders (both local and foreign) have experienced nothing but profits for the period. They are currently the country’s biggest lender by market value and customers. High interest rates earlier on in the year contributed largely to the banks net income of KES 8.3 billion, up from KES 7.29 billion for the same period last year. The counter has also featured among the top traded list for a number of days and boasts a good market capitalization. Today, we shall focus on the volumes traded and see if it will make any material changes to this capitalization.
• KCB – The bank is currently trading at a four year high of KES 30.25 and also boasts of profits for shareholders who gnashed their teeth earlier on this year with a stock price of KES 16.80. “We have seen a lot of appetite for the stock from foreign investors, because the price looks attractive on a price to earnings ratio,” Francis Mwangi, head of research at Nairobi- based Standard Investment Bank Ltd. said in a phone interview with Bloomberg. The counter has also featured among the top traders for most of the past month, much like Equity bank. For today, we shall keep an eye on both price movement and volumes traded.