Ian Dear, Managing Director of Express Catering
The Jamaica Stock Exchange indicated that the maximum price Express Catering could trade at on Friday was $1.86 which came about from a 15 percent average, of the price that triggered the circuit breaker which is $1.75 and the IPO price of $1.50.
Had the first trade, taken place at $1.95 it would have shut down trading in the stock for an hour, but that price would have stood, being 30 percent above the IPO price.
Regardless, investors placed a large number of bids to acquire the stock which was heavily oversubscribed, when the shares were issued to the public. The attached picture shows the bids above $2.20 at the close which are expected to be cancelled, with the closing bids limited to $2 which is the indicative starting price on Monday. That price will determine the maximum price the stock can trade at on Monday. Something must be wrong if investors can place orders into the system only to see them manually cancelled by the exchange after trading ends. This development is public relations and bad news for the exchange, but not many persons seem to care.
The circuit breaker rule put in place to try and prevent wild daily movements in a stock prices seems to have out lived its life. It is not working well with new listings as it is preventing orderly trading in most new listings in the early days of trading.
All the above orders amounting millions of shares in Express Catering will be cancelled after trading on Friday
According to an extract sent by the Jamaica Stock Exchange the Circuit Breaker Rule states that “No stock should trade +/-15% from the close price or the effective close price at the opening of the market. The effective close price is determined whenever the closing bid is greater than the close price or whenever the closing ask is less than the close price. Use the closing bid as the effective close price, if the value is greater than the close price or use the closing ask as the effective close price, if the value is less than the close price. However, during the day if the Circuit Breaker is triggered for a security, the trades at prices outside of the original prescribed band for the security will be disallowed for an hour to allow for the release of market news and a cool down period. The price of the trade that triggered the Circuit Breaker should not be +/-15% outside of the original prescribed price band. After the hour has passed the security will be released for trading within a new prescribed price band based on the new reference price, which is a simple average of the trigger price and the close price. The new reference price will be used to determine the trade range for the remainder of the day. The stock will not be allowed to trade +/- 15% of the new reference price.”
If it is were conceded that there is need for a daily price limit, the above rules have been made more complex than needs be the case. There is no logic in limiting one stock to trade at a 30 percent above the last traded price or indicative price and another to be limited to a lesser amount on the same day because an investor buys a stock at 30 percent above the prior days last price another at 15.1 percent above it which limits the trading for the rest of the day to less than 30 percent in the latter case. The new rules that were approved by the stock exchange in 2014 made no reference to a limit to the bid or offer that can be made during the day, exchange personnel have decided amongst themselves to improperly invoke the additional change that limits trading unnecessarily. The stock exchange should make good sense prevail and allow the above rules to be implemented fully as stated without the introduction of rules that the updated regulations do not include and from all indications were not signed off by the stock exchange council, went the change was submitted for approval. If that is done, it would remove the nonsense that now prevails in the Express Catering trading, with a huge line up of bids above $2 that are slated to be cancelled after trading today.
IC bid-offer Indicator| At the end of trading in the main and US dollar markets, the Investor’s Choice bid-offer indicator reading shows 6 stocks with bids higher than their last selling prices and 2 with lower offers.
Jamaica Producers dropped 98 cents to $14 with 3,000 shares changing hands. Jamaica Stock Exchange added 39 cents to close at $6.49, trading 96,582 shares, JMMB Group exchanged 76,932 shares at $19, Kingston Properties was down 85 cents to $7.15, trading 1,400 units, Kingston Wharves gained 60 cents to close at $31 while exchanging 1,761 units. NCB Financial Group lost 49 cents to close at $72.01, after exchanging 18,521 shares, PanJam Investment closed at $30.45, after falling $2.75 with 59,375 shares trading, Proven Investments exchanged 300,000 shares at $24.65, Pulse Investments closed at $2.25, gaining 25 cents with 6,500 shares changing owners, Radio Jamaica added 2 cents, to close at $1.40, trading of 117,619 shares, Sagicor Group exchanged 35,756 shares at $32.41, having gained 91 cents, Sagicor Real Estate Fund closed at $11.90, with a loss of 10 cents and 149 units switching owners. Salada Foods traded $1 lower to $9 while exchanging 400 units, Scotia Group gained 50 cents and closed at $42 with trades of 78,658 shares, Scotia Investments lost 40 cents to close at $36 trading 76,543 units, Seprod jumped $3.43 to $29.95 trading 6,350 shares, Supreme Ventures lost 20 cents to $7.70, with 56,978 shares trading. Proven Investments US ordinary shares lost 0.01 US cent to close at 23 US cents in exchanging 930,313 units, Proven Investments 8.25% preference share closed at $5, with 11,640 units traded, Jamaica Money Market Brokers 7.5% preference share was up 5 cents to close at $2.05, with 40,000 units changing hands and JMMB Group 7.5% preference share traded 4,047 units at $1.11.
At the close of the market, AMG Packaging fell 65 cents to close at $3.10 with 18,689 units changing hands, Blue Power saw just 200 shares trading to end with a loss of $1 at $49, Cargo Handlers ended trading 24,500 shares to close at $13.75, Caribbean Cream closed trading with 8,000 units and fell $1.60 to end at a 52 weeks’ low of $5, Caribbean Flavours traded 2,500 units to end at $12, Caribbean Producers lost 10 cents and closed trading with 15,936 units, at $3.30. Derrimon Trading ended at $8 with 16,000 shares changing hands, Dolphin Cove ended at $17.50 with 1,900 shares changing hands, General Accident gained 2 cents and closed trading with 3,000 shares to end at $2.72, 
Honey Bun gained 30 cents and closed trading with 19,359 shares at $6, ISP Finance dropped $2 and closed with 31,752 units changing hands at $11, Jamaican Teas lost 20 cents and ended trading 82,972 shares at $4, Jetcon Corporation traded 266,595 shares to end at $4.54, Key Insurance ended at $3.05 with 12,101 shares changing hands, Knutsford Express traded 19,583 shares to end at $14, Lasco Distributors closed 1 cent lower at $6.25 after trading 7,138 units, Lasco Financial ended with 5,301 shares changing hands at $3.55, after rising 15 cents, Main Event rose 10 cents with 13,322 shares trading to end at $5.60, Medical Disposables ended at $5.50 with 6,100 units trading, Paramount Trading ended with 7,785 units changing hands at $2.75 and tTech traded 1,813 units to close at $10.
Jamaica’s foreign exchange market functions for years since the early 1990s, with individuals dealers setting rates they buy and sell foreign exchange for, with limited controls set by the central bank. While the market allocated resources fairly well, it has never been the most perfect system. 
Trading continued on a down ward path each day of the week and hit rock bottom on Wednesday as a mere 192,720 units traded on the Junior Market on Tuesday down from 401,316 units on Tuesday. Traded value declined to $1,219,105 from $2,286,974. 
The value of the Jamaican dollar continues to climb against the US dollar as it heads towards the JS$127 band, with the selling rate for the US dollar falling to J$128.16 from J$128.22 previously. Dealers bought the US currency at an average of J$127.48, up from JS$127.28 on Monday. 
ended at 121,676 units with an average value of $2,563,889 compared with an average of 129,324 units with an average value of $2,758,273 on the previous trading day. The average volume and value for June ended at 218,951 units with an average value of $3,871,959.
Kingston Properties traded 2,000 units, with gains of 5 cents to close at $8.85, Kingston Wharves closed at $30, with a loss of 40 cents with the exchange 1,998 units. Mayberry Investments lost 5 cents to close at $4.65 with 100 units switching owners, NCB Financial Group gained 50 cents to close at $72, after exchanging 818 shares, PanJam Investment traded $3.91 higher, closing at $33.91 with 4,271 shares, Proven Investments declined 38 cents to close at $24.63 with 112,186 shares exchanged, Pulse Investments traded 17,144 shares at $2.59, having gained 10 cents, Radio Jamaica closed at $1.50, gaining 7 cents with 1,150 shares changing hands. Sagicor Group traded 14,566 shares at $32, Sagicor Real Estate Fund closed at $13.50, with gains of 10 cents trading only 100 units. Scotia Group declined 59 cents to close at $41.50, with 28,297 shares trading, Seprod dived $3.48 in closing at $26.52 with a mere 570 shares switching owners. Proven Investments US ordinary shares closed at 23.9 US cents, gaining 0.02 US cents in trading 125,186 units and Proven 8.25% preference share closed 10 cents lower to $5 exchanging 10,300 units.
The value of the Jamaican dollar climbed against the US dollar at the start of the week, versus the close on Friday, with the selling rate for the US dollar falling to J$128.22 from J$128.39 previously. 
Trading on the main market stocks of the Jamaica Stock Exchange picked up over Thursday’s levels but declining stocks numbered more than advancing ones leading to declines in the market indices by more than 1,300 points. 
The main market ended trading with an average of 165,091 units valued at $3,143,410 for each security traded compared to an average of 56,271 units valued at $1,290,623. The average volume and value for the month to date ended at 129,324 units with an average value of $2,758,273 compared with an average of 125,350 units with an average value of $2,715,480 on the previous trading day. The average volume and value for June ended at 218,951 units with an average value of $3,871,959.
Broilers traded 70 cents higher, closing at $18.20, with an exchange of 2,080,661 shares, Jamaica Producers gained 75 cents to close at $14.75 with 10,986 shares changing hands. Jamaica Stock Exchange closed at $6.50, with a loss of 30 cents, trading 920 shares, JMMB Group lost 21 cents to close at $19.31 exchanging 6,645 units, Kingston Properties traded 400 units, losing 5 cents, to close at $8.80, Kingston Wharves closed at $30.40, with an exchange of 13,470 shares. NCB Financial Group dropped 50 cents to close at $71.50, after exchanging 40,147 shares, 1834 Investments traded 219,700 shares, gaining 1 cent to close at $1.37, PanJam Investment plunged $4.25 in closing at $30 while exchanging 201,188 shares, Portland JSX closed at $10.50 with 9,293 shares changing hands, Proven Investments advanced 38 cents to close at $25.01 with 115,000 shares exchanged, Pulse Investments traded 1,669 shares at $2.49, Radio Jamaica gained 5 cents to close at $1.43, with 83,042 shares switching owners. Sagicor Group added $1, closing at $32 with an exchange of 31,500 shares, Sagicor Real Estate Fund closed at $13.40, with gains of $1, trading 6,961 units. Scotia Group declined 31 cents to close at $42.09, with an exchange of 49,507 shares, Scotia Investments lost 1 cent to close at $36 trading 1,500 units, Seprod gained $1 and closed at $30 with 982,293 shares changing hands while Supreme Ventures closed at $7.95, after rising 60 cents and exchanging 75,600 shares. Proven Investments US ordinary shares closed at 22 US cents trading 118,527 units, JMMB Group US 6% preference share exchanged 18,000 units at US$1.12 and JMMB Group7.5% preference share gained 1 cent to close at $1.11, with trades of 953 units.
Inflows into the Jamaican foreign exchange market rose during the past week, compared to the first week in July and selling by dealers dropped. Dealers purchased US$220 million of all currencies, US$6 million more than in the previous week and sold US$165 million, down $15 million for the same period. 
USA dollar entered the system up from US$30 million in the first week of the month.
