Investors cut 4.5 percent or 14,568.35 points in two weeks off the JSE All Jamaican Composite Index, as it dropped 3,027.95 points on Monday to close at 306,608.74. During the same period, the JSE Index dived 13,273.42 or 4.5 percent, to close with a fall of 2,758.81 points on Monday at 279,355.24.
Trading on the Main Market of the Jamaica Stock Exchange ended on Monday with 24 securities changing hands, as 7 advanced, 12 declined and 4 traded firm with 19,187,109 units valued at $205,077,757 compared to 10,390,820 units valued at $339,090,865 on Friday.
Trading ended with an average of 799,463 units for an average of $8,544,907 in contrast to 451,775 units for an average of $14,743,081 on Friday. The average volume and value for the month to date amounts to 358,678 units valued at $5,630,484 and previously, an average of 333,369 units valued at $5,463,149. In contrast, October closed with an average of 1,185,251 units valued at $16,528,582 for each security traded.
IC bid-offer Indicator| At the end of trading, the Investor’s Choice bid-offer indicator reading shows 8 stocks ended with bids higher than their last selling prices and 2 with lower offers.
In the US dollar market Margaritaville ordinary share traded 2,300 units at 19 us cents valued at just US$21.
The main movers for the day are, NCB Financial Group dropping $1, Sagicor Group fell $1.60 trading 2,026,098 units and Seprod jumped $1.80. Ciboney traded at a 52 weeks’ high of 45 cents.
Archives for November 2017
Juniors down sharply again with 11 losers
the prices of Lasco Distributors and Lasco Financial had wild swings on Monday as the courts awarded Lasd $273 million in damages.
Trading on the Junior Market of the Jamaica Stock Exchange, with 17 securities changing hands as the prices of 2 securities advanced, 11 declined and 4 remained unchanged leading to market Index declining 45.44 points to 2,948.96.
Trading on Monday, resulted in an exchange of 2,397,751 units valued at $13,589,523 compared to 1,089,369 units valued at $4,857,835 from 20 securities changing hands on Friday.
At the close of market activities, an average of 141,044 units traded for an average of $799,384 in contrast to 54,468 units for an average of $242,892 on Friday. The average volume and value for the month to date amounts to 113,513 units valued at $558,525 and previously 112,183 units valued at $546,893. In contrast, October closed with average of 74,690 units valued at $362,548 for each security traded.
IC bid-offer Indicator| At the end of trading, the Investor’s Choice bid-offer indicator reading shows 2 stocks ended with bids higher than their last selling prices and 5 with lower offers.
At the close of the market, Access Financial closed with a loss of $1 at $40, with 20,400 shares, Cargo Handlers ended trading with a loss of $1.15 at $10.85, with 19,062 stock units, Caribbean Cream finished with a loss of 5 cents at $5.50, with 10,121 shares, Express Catering ended at $4.50, with 19,030 stock units, Eppley concluded trading with a loss of 50 cents at $11, with 388 units changing hands, Honey Bun settled with a loss of 70 cents at $4, with 12,500 shares. Iron Rock settled at $2.80, with 93,662 shares, Jamaican Teas traded with a loss of 20 cents at $4, with 101,260 units, Jetcon Corporation finished trading with a loss of 10 cents at $4.60, with 87,865 shares,
Key Insurance ended with a loss of 75 cents at $4, with 1,000 stock units, Knutsford Express closed with a loss of 50 cents at $13, with 1,929 shares. Lasco Distributors settled 62 cents higher at $5.69, with 1,200,172 shares, but traded during the morning session at a 52 weeks’ intraday low of $4.50 before recovering ahead of the close. Lasco Financial ended trading with a loss of 8 cents at $6.22, but traded as low as $5.25, and traded 189,907 stock units by the close. Lasco Manufacturing traded at $3.95, with 21,964 units. Main Event closed 39 cents higher at $6, with 418,028 shares, Paramount Trading concluded trading with a loss of 35 cents at $3.15, with 46,753 units, and Stationery and Office ended trading at $5.05, with 153,710 stock units.
Prices of securities trading for the day are those at which the last trade took place.
Trading jumps to $13m on Monday
Trading on the Trinidad & Tobago Stock Exchange jumped to $13 million on Monday from just $514,000 on Friday as Ansa McAL with 56 percent of the volume and 93 percent of the value of securities traded.
The market closed with only 10 securities changing hands down from 11 on Friday, as 5 stocks advanced, 5 held firm and none declining, leading to 354,972 shares traded for $13,441,469, compared to Friday’s trades of 148,999 units valued at just $514,609.
The Composite Index dropped 0.08 points to 1,275.50, the All T&T Index advanced 1.17 points to 1,743.46 and the Cross Listed Index was down 0.18 points to 108.85.
IC bid-offer Indicator| The Investor’s Choice bid-offer ended with 4 stocks with bids higher than last selling prices and 9 with lower offers.
Gains| Securities gaining at the close of market activities are, First Citizens gaining 5 cents and closed at $31.95, with 613 units, Guardian Holdings rising 30 cents to $16 with 6,956 shares changing hands JMMB Group rose 3 cents, in closing at $2.18 and exchanging 132,553 shares.
National Flour Mills closed 10 cents higher to settle at $1.90 with 1,000 units trading and Trinidad & Tobago NGL ended at a 52 weeks’ high of $24.02, having gained 2 cents with 2,677 shares changing hands.
Firm Trades| At the close of trading on Monday,Angostura Holdings remained at $15.05 with 3,000 shares, Ansa McAL closed at $63.03 with 200,000 shares valued at $12,605,985 changing hands Clico Investment exchanged 2,800 shares at $21. Massy Holdings held firm at $48 with 5,205 shares traded and National Enterprises closed at $9.70 with 168 units.
Lasco Distributors shocker
Lasco Distributors awarded $273 million by the court.
The company advised that the formal order was signed by Justice Vivene Harris and filed on November 24, 2017. LASD has further advised of the Company’s intent to file an appeal.
The amount awarded for damages and interest up to November 3, 2017, is way below the US$311 million the company claimed plus interest.
At the time of the Initial Public Offering in 2010 the prospectus stated “no provisions have been made in the Company’s accounts for the impact of the outcome of this decision and the accounts contained in this prospectus do not take it into account. It is the expectation of the Company, based on legal advice it has received, that its lost sales of the product to date (estimated to be $400 million) are likely to be recovered in the event that it succeeds in this matter but it is difficult to quantify the amount of damages that could potentially be awarded to the Company as they will continue to accrue until the matter is decided.
The amount awarded which should be profit that would have be lost as a result of the loss of sales may not in reality be far from the profit lost to 2010 but there would be loss of sales thereafter.
Last week, Lasco Distributors advised the Jamaica Stock Exchange that a director sold 2,042,774 shares on November 11, and on November 24 that a directors sold 21,054 shares during the period November 13-14, 2017.
VMBS Wealth heading to market
VM Wealth planning to list soon..
There was a time when there was a drought of listings on the Jamaica Stock Exchange with the advent of the Junior Market and its success there seem to be information on coming listings cropping up regularly.
Word reaching IC Insider.com is the VMBS Wealth Management will head to market in early 2018 to be listed on the exchange. Contacts make by this publication was wet with the response that they could not respond on such matters at this time.
For 2017 the stock exchange had confirmed about 16 potential listings for the year, inclusive of preference shares. The year will definitely close short of the target, but between December and the end of 2018 is setting up to be a bumper period that increase the listings to more than 100 for the very first time.
FosRich offer will open officially on December 4 to raise just over $200 million and is brokered by Stocks and Securities who confirmed that they are working on another listing but could not release the name of the company.
With Elite Diagnostics reconfirming their intention to go to market soon, the number of potential listings are climbing. Wisynco Group is expected to release its prospectus shortly with whispers suggesting by this week end.
More trading activity is expected in the future as a results of new listing and the impact of the fall in interest rates will have on trading activities. The exchange now has 92 listings with a few duplicated ones in the main market and US dollar market will see and there could be four on the exchange suggest before the year ends with three of them regarded as definite. Brokers say they are working on 8 new ones for 2018 currently, Marlene Street Forrest, Managing Director of the Jamaica Stock Exchange advised IC Insider.com.
The three are expected to be GWest, a medical complex out of Montego Bay, is expected to raise over $400 million, the company income will come from a combination of rent from the major part of the complex and fees from operating small short term medical facility. The complex currently has a number of blue chip clients as tenants.
NCB Capital Markets Manager, Origination and Structuring Stanley Thompson (left) exchanges laughs with Wisynco Group Limited Chairman William Mahfood also sharing are Wisynco Chief Executive Officer Andrew Mahfood and PriceWaterhouseCoopers Director Fiona Hyman
Wisynco Group is looking to raise for itself $1 billion but some of its current shareholders wanting to cash out. Information suggests that shares are to be offered to a wide array of persons including the 700 staff members as well as a large number of customers hence the shares from the IPO could be pretty scarce. Caribbean Insurance Brokers being handled by Mayberry Investments is the fourth possible 2017 listings. Mayberry is also working with Neveast Supplies but this seems to be a 2018 listing.
Others that should see their ordinary shares listed on the Jamaica Stock Exchange, include Jamaica Plumbing and Supplies, the government’s owned Wighton Wind Farms, Jamaica Public Service Company, with the government wanting to dispose of its shares in the power company, KIW International that has taken the decision to have the company relisted. UCC Online, a segment of University of the Caribbean was expected to have gone to the market this year but have been ironing out issues to facilitate the initial public offering, they could be ready in 2018 and Sygnus Capital Investments should list in the first quarter of 2018 on the main market of the exchange. Sygnus is relatively new company established to undertake loans or make medium term investments in medium size businesses. The company which is registered in St Lucia is managed by Sygnus Capital Management a Cayman Island based corporation. The company raised US$15 million in capital and is aiming for another $5 million when they come to market, which could be as early as January next year. According to our source they have so far lent out US$11 million and generated a higher rate of return that originally expected. The company has a good stream of potential users of its funds.
Derrimon out Kremi is back in TOP 10
Derrimon Trading reentered the TOP 10 last week but has spent just one week rising during the week from $6.50 to $8 and is replaced by Caribbean Cream, the only new entrant to the TOP list.
Jamaica Broilers slipped to $17.50 during the week and moved to the top of the main market listing with Berger Paints moving to Number 3 position having closed at $16.50 on Friday while Salada Foods rose to $10 and fell to 7th spot.
At the close of Friday, the average PE ratio for 
Junior Market Top stocks is at 9.2 and a PE at 8.6 for the main market TOP 10. The average PE for the overall main market is 14.7 and 14.4 for Junior Market, based on 2017 estimated earnings.
At the close of the week, IC Insider.com’s TOP 10 stocks now trade at an average discount of 34 percent to the average of the market for Junior Market Top stocks and 42 percent for the main market.
Market Watch| The two markets have retreated to be testing support and some individual stocks seem to be more in a mood for profit taking than wanting to move much higher currently, as such stocks may not gain 
much during the week ahead, but that is difficult to know. Investors should nevertheless keep a keen eye on Caribbean Cement for which supply seems to be declining fast, Cable & Wireless that appears scarce under $1, NCB Financial, Berger Paints, JMMB Group, Main Event, Lasco Financial, Paramount Trading and Stationery and Office.
US$22.5m for Berger Caribbean
Ansa Coatings US$22.5 million in cash to acquire the holding company of holding the majority shares in Berger’s operations in Barbados, Jamaica, and Trinidad and Tobago in July 2017.
The amount was stated in the valuation report done by PriceWaterhouseCoopers for the Berger Trinidad. According to the report “ANSA represented to us that a total cash consideration paid for the investment in LBOH, of which US$2.976 million was allocated to the 3,613,011 BPTL ordinary shares (representing a value of TT$5.60 per share at a conversion rate of US$1 = TT$ 6.79). ASNA further represented that the purchase consideration was not derived based on an individual territory/ subsidiary basis but for the Caribbean operations as a whole.”
The payment places the consideration of shares in the Jamaican company, close to the price of $10.88 that was offered to the Jamaican shareholders.
According to the report the PWC reports state that “we understand that the offeror also obtained a valuation from an independent valuator as at 31 March 2017. This report estimated that the value of 100% of BPTL’s issued share to be within the range of $4.41 to $5.00 per share, with the best estimate being the midpoint of $4.70 per share.”
ACI made an offer to acquire the remaining minority shares at $6.76 per share, the price it paid to Cham Ramlal ltd. for 9.69% of the shareholding a huge premium over the traded price around $4.05. The cost to acquire the remainder of Berger Trinidad will be just over US$720,000.
The Directors recommended that the shareholders accept the offer. In doing so they took account of the fact that ANSA McAL exercises control and direction over approximately 80.86 percent of the issued and outstanding share capital of the Company. Consequently, the remaining shareholders will, in effect, have limited power to challenge any decisions of the offeror and its affiliates. Further, where the offeror, pursuant to the offer, acquires 90 per cent of the offer shares, there are statutory provisions which empower the offeror to acquire the shares of those shareholders who do not accept the offer.
They also considered the fact that the offer was well ahead of the historical price the stock traded at in the past and the poor profit performance in the past with more expected to come as well as the fairness opinion by PWC. All of that was done without trying to frighten shareholders into giving up their shares and is in complete contrast to the recommendations of Jamaican directors, using false information and withholding others pertinent information from the local shareholders, in trying to bully hem into giving away their shares. Warren McDonald a director of Berger Jamaica is one of the directors of the Trinidad company.
Jamaica’s inflation moderates but elevated
Inflation in Jamaica remains at an elevated level with the Consumer Price Index for October 2017 registering an increase rate of 0.4 percent, down from 0.7 percent in September.
The rate of inflation for the calendar year-to-date is 4 percent and for the past twelve months is running at 4.7 percent. The fiscal year-to-date inflation is 3 percent.
According to data released by Statin, the division of Housing, Water, Electricity, Gas and Other Fuels mainly impacted the movement as it increased by 1.7 percent. This was due chiefly to a 2.2 percent increase in the group, Electricity, Gas and Other Fuels. Additionally, there was a 2.7 percent increase for the group Water,
Increased fuel prices added to inflation.
Supply and Miscellaneous Services Related to the Dwelling, due to higher water and sewage rates. Food and Non-Alcoholic Beverages advanced by 0.3 percent influenced mainly by increased prices for items in the class ‘Vegetables and Starchy Foods. Alcoholic Beverages and Tobacco division recorded the second highest movement, 0.7 percent for the month.
The other divisions that recorded increases in the All Jamaica Clothing and Footwear’ 0.1 percent, ‘Furnishings, Household Equipment and Routine Household Maintenance’ 0.2 percent, ‘Health’ 0.2 percent, ‘Recreation and Culture’ 0.2 percent, Restaurants and Accommodation Services’ 0.1 percent and ‘Miscellaneous Goods and Services’ 0.1 percent. There were no movement for each of the divisions ‘Communication’ and ‘Education’.
Jamaican stocks shed more blood – Friday
It was an all reds day in trading on the Jamaica Stock Exchange on Friday with all market indices falling. In the main market 23 securities changed hands, 8 advanced, 8 declined and 7 traded firm.
The JSE All Jamaican Composite Index dropped 2,030.31 points to 309,636.69 and is now just above support level on the technical channel that it broke through in October as the market retest support. The JSE Index dived 1,849.84 points to 282,114.05.
Trading ended with 10,390,820 units valued at $339,090,865 compared to 3,984,045 units valued at $54,400,232 on Thursday with an average of 451,775 units for an average of $14,743,081, in contrast to 189,716 units for an average of $2,590,487 on Thursday. The average volume and value for the month to date, amounts to 333,369 units valued at $5,463,149 and previously 326,475 units valued at $4,922,799. In contrast, October closed with an average of 1,185,251 units valued at $16,528,582 for each security traded.
The US dollar market index fell 9.06 points to 168.15 as 2 securities traded lower with a volume of 26,719 units valued at US$29,135. Trading in both markets lead to a volume of 10,417,539 units valued at J$$342,761,884.
IC bid-offer Indicator| At the end of trading, the Investor’s Choice bid-offer indicator reading shows 9 stocks ended with bids higher than their last selling prices and 1 with lower offers.
In the US dollar market JMMB Group 6% US dollar preference share traded 25,841 units at $1.12, down from $1.121 previously and Proven Investments traded 878 ordinary shares at 22 US cents after slipping 2 cents.
The main movers for the day were, Caribbean Cement ended with a loss of $2.49, NCB Financial Group dropping $4.40 and Sagicor Group gaining $1.10. PanJam Investment traded 4,370,132 shares, Sagicor Group traded 3,011,732 units and Supreme Ventures settled with 1,109,526 shares.
Juniors down sharply with 9 losers
The Junior Market of the lost much grounds on Friday on a day when all the Jamaica Stock Exchange indices declined. The Junior Market Index declined 50.10 points to close at 2,994.40 and follows a 22 points fall on Thursday.
Trading on the ended with the prices of 9 securities declining, 3 rising, and 7 remained unchanged with 20 securities changing hands, resulting in an exchange of 1,089,369 units valued at $4,857,835 compared to 1,766,060 units valued at $7,828,514 on Thursday, from 22 securities.
Trading ended with an average of 54,468 units for an average of $242,892 in contrast to 80,275 units for an average of $355,842 on Thursday. The average volume and value for the month to date amounts to 112,183 units valued at $546,893 and previously 115,661 units valued at $565,207. 
In contrast, October closed with average of 74,690 units valued at $362,548 for each security traded.
IC bid-offer Indicator| At the end of trading, the Investor’s Choice bid-offer indicator reading shows 3 stocks ended with bids higher than their last selling prices and 3 with lower offers.
At the close of the market, Access Financial closed with a loss of 1 cent at $41, with 127 shares, Cargo Handlers ended trading 99 cents higher at $12, with 1,000 stock units, Caribbean Cream finished at $5.55, with 600 shares, Caribbean Producers traded with a loss of 30 cents at $4.20, with 50,447 units, Express Catering ended 10 cents higher at $4.50, with 31,819 stock units, General Accident finished at $2.70, with 31,827 shares. Honey Bun settled with a loss of 10 cents at $4.70, with 2,065 shares,
The chart now carries the dividends declared fro the last twelve months and the yields based on the last traded price of each stock.
Prices of securities trading for the day are those at which the last trade took place.
