Building liquidity reserves for Amoc IPO drives the market down. Wael Gamal reports Lighter trading and mildly negative performance continued to dominate the market in its first session of this week. Investors were selling in order to raise money for the IPO of Alexandria Mineral Oil Company (AMOC), which brokers expect to be about 10 times oversubscribed. The Egyptian government is offering 8.61 million shares in AMOC to retail investors at LE45 a share, yet investors have already applied for four times that amount. Applicants must submit 25 per cent of the total amount, thus necessitating the withdrawal of their money from the market until at least Wednesday or Thursday, at which time the AMOC offering will end. On Sunday, the benchmark Hermes index ended down 272.47 points, or 0.6 per cent, at 44,790.04 as losers topped gainers at a ratio of 21 to six leaving two stocks flat while the broad CIBC index descended 0.36 per cent to close at 159.91 points, dragged down by the tourism, engineering, and service sectors. Total turnover dropped to LE299 million compared to last week's average of LE372 million. EFG-Hermes topped the day's turnover list with LE55.3 million worth of shares changing hands. Yet, the stock lost 0.4 per cent to close at LE 47.84. Tourah Cement led the gainers' list after grabbing three per cent to close at LE96.34. Media Production City came in second with an increase of 2.8 per cent to close at LE10.36. Olympic Group however, recorded the worst performance of the week slipping 6.6 per cent. Market activity was essentially the same last week except that indices were still going up. The CASE 30 index concluded the week at 5127 points; up by 0.7 per cent, despite the profit taking and liquidation activities made by some investors. Foreign trading remained high amidst a wave of optimism following the conclusion of the first multi-candidate presidential elections. The total value traded reached LE2,197 billion compared to LE2,236 billion during the previous week while total volume went down to reach 66 million shares compared to 74 million shares last week. The market performance reflected positively on the activity of all sectors. Maintaining the same ranking, the Clothes and Textile sector was the week's most active sector recording 14.4 million traded shares, albeit for the relatively low value of LE139 million. This was primarily driven by the heavy activity of the sector's three main companies consisting of around 82 per cent of the sector's volume traded. Arab Cotton Ginning, Nile Cotton Ginning and Arab Polvara Spinning & Weaving Co ranked first, fifth and seventh in terms of volume traded, respectively.
