Scotia pushes JSE down sharply Friday

Investors reacted to Scotia Group’s report of lower profits in the April quarter by pushing the price of the stock down $2.99, resulting a sharp fall in the Jamaica Stock Exchange indices by more than 3,800 points, on Friday.
The All Jamaican Composite Index dived sharply by 4,246.63 points to 331,495.46 and the JSE Index had a big drop of 3,869.16 points to 302,029.82.
The volume of stocks trading on the main market was 7,187,416 units valued at $228,155,035 compared to 11,661,188 units valued at $284,601,737 on Thursday.
The main trades were, Grace Kennedy with 3,116,194 units accounting for 43.36 percent of trading, followed by Carreras with 1,575,999 units and 21.93 percent of the day’s volume and Supreme Ventures with 800,000 units.
Market activities resulted in 25 securities trading, compared to 29 on Thursday in the main and US dollar markets of which 12 advanced, 6 declined and 7 traded firm while Jamaica Broilers and JMMB Group 7% preference share closed at record high price.
Stocks with major price changes are, Jamaica Broilers jumping $3.10 to a record close of $26.30, JMMB Group falling $1 to close at $27.50, NCB Financial up $1.24 to $96.50, PanJam Investment up $1.33 to $51.98 and Scotia Group dived $2.99 to $50.01.
Trading resulted in an average of 312,496 units valued at an average of $9,919,784 for each security traded. In contrast to 448,507 units for an average of $10,946,221 on Thursday. For the month to date 197,915 units traded with an average value of $6,902,395 and on the previous day 217,527 units traded with an average value of $6,588,540 on average. May closed with an average of 589,414 shares with a value of $16,532.367, for each security traded.
In the US dollar market, 149,071 units valued at over $29,638 traded with Sterling Investments trading 438 units at 10 US cents and Proven Investments rose 1 cent with 148,633 units trading to close at 20 US cents. The JSE USD Equities Index advanced 4.22 points to close at 166.95.
IC bid-offer Indicator| At the end of trading, the Investor’s Choice bid-offer indicator reading shows 4 stocks ended with bids higher than their last selling prices and 4 closing with lower offers.
For more details of market activities see – JSE main market close down on Friday.