MainaT's tagging of my self at http://mjengakenya.blogspot.com/ has made me break my silence sooner than I had planned. In 2008 like Murphy's law says, everything that could go wrong did. After starting the year with Kenyans having been transformed from brother keepers to brother killers, the world's financial melt down, the collapse of most financial markets including our own NSE, hyper inflation, record fuel and energy costs, failing rains among others, 2008's end will surely be welcomed with a collective huge sigh of relief.
Like I had blogged earlier, I had summoned enough courage earlier and dumped most of my portfolio before the real massacre begun, so my losses were not as much as those of many Kenyan's I know of. Even though the NSE slide seems to have been temporarily checked, I have this gut feeling that the market has not hit rock bottom yet and I am safely giving it a wait and see approach.
As I compile my wish list for 2009, top on the list is a desire that the grand confusion government will sort out their priorities and ensure certain basics are sorted out. Surely asking that certain issues are resolved is not asking for too much, ie 1.IDPs are gotten out of the tents, 2.Unga is made available and affordable, and finally, 3. I should not think it's a miracle of sorts when I drive into any Petrol station and, Yes, amazing as it may be, get fuel in stock.
Sunday, December 28, 2008
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
POLITICS: OUR CURSE?
Last evening as I shuffled through channels seeking business news, I noted that there seem to be a silent agreement between the NSE and the media houses not to accelerate the panic at the bourse with one just glossing over the days performance and another not even bothering to report on the days activity. However one station, which seems to relish on negatives news very much, gave a detailed report of the continuing massacre. The News anchor either out of ignorance or sadistic malice gleefully reported on the slide in a manner, such that, if one entered into the room midway, one would be forgiven to think that she was reporting about a massive bull run. Digressing, outside their pretty faces[depending on the eyes of the beholder], what other criteria do those who employ them consider for employment because in my honest opinion, some of them, fit the African version of the stereotype blond.
While there are many reasons as to why most exchanges in the world are bearish, Ours is also compounded by our politics. I wish there was a way where we could round up all these politicians, lock them up and throw away the key. Whether its the buffoon dully elected president, who lately, even junior civil servants seem to have very little respect for, the clownish right honorable Prime Minister, or the dwarfish president wannabe, the politics they played have put us in the current mess. And what is their loss? none!!!! They continue getting their obscene perks and continue to have have influence to even get more affluent even as, us ordinary mortals, continue fighting one another over them, as inflation continue to strangle us and our value continues getting eroded as the NSE slides, interest rates rises and property like homes keep getting out of our reach.
What is our curse that we allow these bunch of users to continue raping us. Exit the Duly elected, enters another bunch of clowns. One has the temerity to aspire to rule us after his Father grabbed with impunity all the land that ordinary folks died fighting for while another shamelessly embarks on political campaigns even when wounds caused by similar activities last year, have not had bandages removed.
Who, pray, shall lock lock up this crowd for us?
While there are many reasons as to why most exchanges in the world are bearish, Ours is also compounded by our politics. I wish there was a way where we could round up all these politicians, lock them up and throw away the key. Whether its the buffoon dully elected president, who lately, even junior civil servants seem to have very little respect for, the clownish right honorable Prime Minister, or the dwarfish president wannabe, the politics they played have put us in the current mess. And what is their loss? none!!!! They continue getting their obscene perks and continue to have have influence to even get more affluent even as, us ordinary mortals, continue fighting one another over them, as inflation continue to strangle us and our value continues getting eroded as the NSE slides, interest rates rises and property like homes keep getting out of our reach.
What is our curse that we allow these bunch of users to continue raping us. Exit the Duly elected, enters another bunch of clowns. One has the temerity to aspire to rule us after his Father grabbed with impunity all the land that ordinary folks died fighting for while another shamelessly embarks on political campaigns even when wounds caused by similar activities last year, have not had bandages removed.
Who, pray, shall lock lock up this crowd for us?
Saturday, September 6, 2008
NSE NIGHTMARES
After watching my value continue to slide in the last 2 months, this week I have taken a bold move which I never thought I could; I bailed out of all my counters.
I, like most investors come in strongly post KENGEN when the market was bullish, and therefore most of my portfolio was bought almost at their peak however I preyed on some stocks which I had handsome gain in capital. As a result factoring in all dividends received, bonus issue and Rights issue gains, my loss averaged to something like -8%
Counters contributing major loses include
Mumias
Kenya Airways
Barclays Bank
BAT
Counters with reasonable Capital gains include
CENTUM
EQUITY
KENGEN
NIC
CMC
KENYA RE
WAY FORWARD
After this bold move I can now watch the market with an opportunistic view than with the dread I have doing lately as I observed my value get eroded by the current bear. However I am a much more experienced player and the lessons I have learned iclude
1 Do not over diversify, concentrate on a maximum of 4 counters whose value you believe in and can provide future growth prospects.
2. Never follow the herd, Safaricom being my most bitter experience. In future I will not participate in very liquid IPO's, in short over supply in shares is counter productive for an an investor with an eye on capital gains
I, like most investors come in strongly post KENGEN when the market was bullish, and therefore most of my portfolio was bought almost at their peak however I preyed on some stocks which I had handsome gain in capital. As a result factoring in all dividends received, bonus issue and Rights issue gains, my loss averaged to something like -8%
Counters contributing major loses include
Mumias
Kenya Airways
Barclays Bank
BAT
Counters with reasonable Capital gains include
CENTUM
EQUITY
KENGEN
NIC
CMC
KENYA RE
WAY FORWARD
After this bold move I can now watch the market with an opportunistic view than with the dread I have doing lately as I observed my value get eroded by the current bear. However I am a much more experienced player and the lessons I have learned iclude
1 Do not over diversify, concentrate on a maximum of 4 counters whose value you believe in and can provide future growth prospects.
2. Never follow the herd, Safaricom being my most bitter experience. In future I will not participate in very liquid IPO's, in short over supply in shares is counter productive for an an investor with an eye on capital gains
Thursday, August 21, 2008
Githongo, Hero or Villain
John Githongo, the self exiled former PS in Ethics and governance jetted back into the country late Tuesday and even before his jet lag had worn off, he, in the company of his former associates in the activism world, gives controversial advice about economic amnesty to perpetrators of grand larceny. On this one, I agree with him since these crooks have learn't to take advantage of the loop holes in law using the looted wealth to hire the best lawyers to delay the cases for ever. Give them amnesty, but lets have what they looted back. A good example being the Grand Regency Hotel in which Kamlesh Patini engaged the government in unending legal tussles which had dragged on for over a decade with no end in sight.
To label Githongo as either a villain or hero, to be fair, really depends on the side of political divide one is inclined to. There are those who applauds him for his contribution in tagging Kibaki's regime as a hoard of corrupt scoundrels which justified the political backlash the regime has suffered this far. On the other hand there are those who view the man as a traitor who committed treasonable acts of playing to the gallery of neocolonialists at the expense of his motherland.
I would like to take a middle ground and objectively look at this matter without any political clouds in my vision. Yes, Githongo is a hero in as much as he prevented deals of the levels of Anglo leasing to get checked, for now and the future. However, his modus operandi in going about this, in my opinion was all wrong. First, as a senior government official you do not demean yourself by strapping yourself with a recorder and tape your seniors. I am sure there were other means at his disposal which he could have employed towards this end without degrading himself to a private sleuth. Secondly his claims of fear for his life, and hence justifying his fleeing were, again according to my opinion, not sincere. Kibaki may be many things, but, a murderer he definitely isn't.
His first appointment on return, though telling, the company he chooses to keep way forward should give us an inkling us to where Githongo is coming from.
For me, I will reserve my conclusion about the man and wait for the success of his endeavors. This is the only means to establish whether all the hullabaloo he raised was worth it, or it was just a means of upping his CV.
To label Githongo as either a villain or hero, to be fair, really depends on the side of political divide one is inclined to. There are those who applauds him for his contribution in tagging Kibaki's regime as a hoard of corrupt scoundrels which justified the political backlash the regime has suffered this far. On the other hand there are those who view the man as a traitor who committed treasonable acts of playing to the gallery of neocolonialists at the expense of his motherland.
I would like to take a middle ground and objectively look at this matter without any political clouds in my vision. Yes, Githongo is a hero in as much as he prevented deals of the levels of Anglo leasing to get checked, for now and the future. However, his modus operandi in going about this, in my opinion was all wrong. First, as a senior government official you do not demean yourself by strapping yourself with a recorder and tape your seniors. I am sure there were other means at his disposal which he could have employed towards this end without degrading himself to a private sleuth. Secondly his claims of fear for his life, and hence justifying his fleeing were, again according to my opinion, not sincere. Kibaki may be many things, but, a murderer he definitely isn't.
His first appointment on return, though telling, the company he chooses to keep way forward should give us an inkling us to where Githongo is coming from.
For me, I will reserve my conclusion about the man and wait for the success of his endeavors. This is the only means to establish whether all the hullabaloo he raised was worth it, or it was just a means of upping his CV.
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
ASPIRATIONS: NEED TO MAKE CONSTANT REVISIONS
With the current Bear run at the NSE causing the not so brave hearts unending jolts, and having to watch our portfolio values getting eroded by the day, I would wish to momentarily veer off from the intentioned content of this blog and share some experience.
I recently had to go bury my uncle who in my tradition should be more accurately be referred to as my "Elder Father". This was happening at place about 300 kilometers from the capital. About 200 Kilometers of this was on good road taking up 2 hours of the 7 for the whole journey. The final part is a mere 95 Km but the torturous road condition, which took the remaining 5 hours made me understand why infrastructure is so key to a modern economy
I have made three trips to this place in my life time. The first one was when I was quite young, at Primary 2. The trip made in the company of my brother and Dad is clearly etched in my memory. Just like us, my uncle's sons were young and in the innocence of youth, time spent with them, playing funny games in the fields was enthralling. My uncle was then an enterprising man with successful businesses in the "foreign" land. He had this Zeal about him and had so much hope in his young Family and the future. Since we made the journey overnight, in the morning, on our way back home, the taste of the tea and the toast, coated with a generous layer of margarine, known as "bandika" in our local lingua, taken at some hotel at the then "Machakos airport" bus station was so relishing to my young mouth, that to this day, I still remember it, but I digress.
Fast forward, my second trip was around ten years later. I was on holiday waiting to get admitted to a higher institution of learning. By this time, the economy had under the hands of one D T Moi, been taking a serious beating. The hitherto thriving businesses in that area were visibly struggling. Most of my cousins had dropped from formal schooling with their father taking advantage of them as unpaid or cheap labor in his then apparently ailing businesses. Being adolescents, we still had a lot of bonding interests, like "hunting" for beautiful lasses who made our raging hormones go hyper.
Over the years, though, I never went back there again; I became a constant SOS target to both my uncle and cousins for some unending problems about this and that
My latest trip back there was an unfortunate one. After persevering a long stressful period of having to see what he had acquired in his younger days go to waste, with some of his charged properties to a Farmers credit source, AFC, being threatened with auction, while in other properties, having being invaded by squatters, who even armed with eviction court orders but with no financial capacity to effect, refused to budge from the land, and with most of his sons village idlers and visible abusers of substances; alcohol or more potent stuff, he had decided that some pesticides were not only made for annoying pests like rats or bedbugs but could be turned to some other uses like ending his life. So determined to die was he such that, some stuff he vomited was so potent that as I was told, ten domestic fowls, which unfortunately in a quest to get nourishment, on the place the vomit landed, met early death
So here I was, along with my kin, having to make the torturous journey just to throw a handful of soil into his grave and hence participate in burying him. Sometimes when I think about the amount of resources we spend, both financial and time so as to conform with our cultural norms, I wonder whether this "Africaness" of ours is worth it, but again I digress.
The moral of this sad story is that we must keep reassessing our ambitions and aspirations, constantly modifying them along the way, otherwise we might just end up like my uncle; frustrated, disillusioned and tired with life
I recently had to go bury my uncle who in my tradition should be more accurately be referred to as my "Elder Father". This was happening at place about 300 kilometers from the capital. About 200 Kilometers of this was on good road taking up 2 hours of the 7 for the whole journey. The final part is a mere 95 Km but the torturous road condition, which took the remaining 5 hours made me understand why infrastructure is so key to a modern economy
I have made three trips to this place in my life time. The first one was when I was quite young, at Primary 2. The trip made in the company of my brother and Dad is clearly etched in my memory. Just like us, my uncle's sons were young and in the innocence of youth, time spent with them, playing funny games in the fields was enthralling. My uncle was then an enterprising man with successful businesses in the "foreign" land. He had this Zeal about him and had so much hope in his young Family and the future. Since we made the journey overnight, in the morning, on our way back home, the taste of the tea and the toast, coated with a generous layer of margarine, known as "bandika" in our local lingua, taken at some hotel at the then "Machakos airport" bus station was so relishing to my young mouth, that to this day, I still remember it, but I digress.
Fast forward, my second trip was around ten years later. I was on holiday waiting to get admitted to a higher institution of learning. By this time, the economy had under the hands of one D T Moi, been taking a serious beating. The hitherto thriving businesses in that area were visibly struggling. Most of my cousins had dropped from formal schooling with their father taking advantage of them as unpaid or cheap labor in his then apparently ailing businesses. Being adolescents, we still had a lot of bonding interests, like "hunting" for beautiful lasses who made our raging hormones go hyper.
Over the years, though, I never went back there again; I became a constant SOS target to both my uncle and cousins for some unending problems about this and that
My latest trip back there was an unfortunate one. After persevering a long stressful period of having to see what he had acquired in his younger days go to waste, with some of his charged properties to a Farmers credit source, AFC, being threatened with auction, while in other properties, having being invaded by squatters, who even armed with eviction court orders but with no financial capacity to effect, refused to budge from the land, and with most of his sons village idlers and visible abusers of substances; alcohol or more potent stuff, he had decided that some pesticides were not only made for annoying pests like rats or bedbugs but could be turned to some other uses like ending his life. So determined to die was he such that, some stuff he vomited was so potent that as I was told, ten domestic fowls, which unfortunately in a quest to get nourishment, on the place the vomit landed, met early death
So here I was, along with my kin, having to make the torturous journey just to throw a handful of soil into his grave and hence participate in burying him. Sometimes when I think about the amount of resources we spend, both financial and time so as to conform with our cultural norms, I wonder whether this "Africaness" of ours is worth it, but again I digress.
The moral of this sad story is that we must keep reassessing our ambitions and aspirations, constantly modifying them along the way, otherwise we might just end up like my uncle; frustrated, disillusioned and tired with life
Saturday, August 9, 2008
BEAR RUN
The post SAFARICOM IPO effect has caused the longest bear run witnessed at the NSE in a long while. Market Capitalization has lost a staggering close to 300B in the last seven weeks or so with no signs of abating yet. My own portfolio which had shown signs of inching upwards after the post election fiasco has moved into the red zone. What strategy should investors take?
First it depends on ones rules of engagement at the bourse. For speculators, dumping positions here and there and cashing on the discounted counters with a view to even out in the long run is the way to go.
For those on a long haul, hopefully with extra cash to invest, buying more into those counters one has taken a position on should see a reduction in the red figures. Woe unto those whose total investing cash is already tied down on the fast sliding counters. My advice to the latter category; just make observation of the market trend in general, without too much focus on your counters, this way, even though you are losing value daily in the bear run, you save your heart from too many unhealthy jolts.
Which category am I in? I am a long hauler and has never sold any stock at a loss. Lets keep our fingers crossed that this thing is ending soon otherwise there is no economic fundamentals to justify the massive losses that have been experienced.
First it depends on ones rules of engagement at the bourse. For speculators, dumping positions here and there and cashing on the discounted counters with a view to even out in the long run is the way to go.
For those on a long haul, hopefully with extra cash to invest, buying more into those counters one has taken a position on should see a reduction in the red figures. Woe unto those whose total investing cash is already tied down on the fast sliding counters. My advice to the latter category; just make observation of the market trend in general, without too much focus on your counters, this way, even though you are losing value daily in the bear run, you save your heart from too many unhealthy jolts.
Which category am I in? I am a long hauler and has never sold any stock at a loss. Lets keep our fingers crossed that this thing is ending soon otherwise there is no economic fundamentals to justify the massive losses that have been experienced.
Tuesday, July 8, 2008
PARLIAMENT: Power must be checked
With Kimunya finally resigning the deafening din on the Grand Regency saga might finally tone down.
However without appearing like I am defending the beleaguered man, we must address the fact that Parliament can actually hound an innocent man. By the time the NO CONFIDENCE MOTION was passed, there were no facts before the house to warrant the action. That Kimunya has no true friends in that house came out clearly in that debate with no one ready to stick out their necks out for him.
Absolute power, regardless of the institution wielding it, is dangerous and those currently celebrating parliament action may have to contend with this sooner or later.
However, one positive thing from this drama is that, as Kenyans we can rest assured that any theft of our assets from whichever quarter shall increasingly get difficult especially if two antagonistic political sides like our Grand coalition Government continue to govern side by side
However without appearing like I am defending the beleaguered man, we must address the fact that Parliament can actually hound an innocent man. By the time the NO CONFIDENCE MOTION was passed, there were no facts before the house to warrant the action. That Kimunya has no true friends in that house came out clearly in that debate with no one ready to stick out their necks out for him.
Absolute power, regardless of the institution wielding it, is dangerous and those currently celebrating parliament action may have to contend with this sooner or later.
However, one positive thing from this drama is that, as Kenyans we can rest assured that any theft of our assets from whichever quarter shall increasingly get difficult especially if two antagonistic political sides like our Grand coalition Government continue to govern side by side
Friday, June 20, 2008
NSE: NOT LOGICAL ANYMORE
After observing the NSE trends lately, I am baffled by it's unpredictability. I expected the massive refunds from the Safaricom IPO to cause a mini bull run with the investors putting back at least some of the refunds back into the market and hence boasting the Index to rise. But strangely, the index was rising when everybody else in the economy experienced a liquidity crunch due to the the amounts held up by the IPO. I measured a rise of 0.43%, 1.89% and 6.81% in the NSE index over preceding weeks in the 21st, 22nd and 23rd week respectively, a time when the crunch was at it's worst. Refunds started getting back to investors on June 9th and while I admit that there has been a lot of issues around this matter with many complaining of delays, at least some people, I included received these refunds on time but I measured a drop in the NSE Index with drops of -0.91% and -1.19% in the 24th and 25th weeks closing today.
Just why is NSE behaving this way? Could everybody be trying to chase the Mirage which is Safaricom and if that is the case why are we not seeing a huge leap on the value of this share? Could Safaricom have disillusioned many such that the amounts being ploughed back are minimal? Time will tell
Just why is NSE behaving this way? Could everybody be trying to chase the Mirage which is Safaricom and if that is the case why are we not seeing a huge leap on the value of this share? Could Safaricom have disillusioned many such that the amounts being ploughed back are minimal? Time will tell
Wednesday, May 28, 2008
SAFARICOM: POST IPO
With the release of their results safaricoms jury is out. As anticipated the company continues to return unprecedentedly high profits and has managed to remain perched at the top of the most profitable company in East and central Africa.
With a PBT profit of about 20B and an PAT profit of 13.8B giving it an earning of 0.345Ksh considering that their issued shares stand at 40B. This means that the company will in a weeks time enter the NSE at PE ratio of 14.5 at least for the local investor segment. With their growth potential the stock enters as among the cheapest within the commercial and services segment at NSE
Though their subscriber growth rate appears to be flattening and future new customers expected to have lower Average Revenue per User[ARPU], their new services continue to baffle many. In the month of March alone 3billion was transferred through their MPESA service. They have also embarked on an aggressive campaign to capture a significant market share in the Internet business through their broadband modem router.
In essence what this mans is that safaricom is combining services provided by, banking, mobile telephony and ICT all rolled into one. Given the growth potential of all these sectors safaricom appears like it will be one company to watch carefully.
In the mobile telephony though they anticipate strong competition, their competitors have one heck of a job to do to really cause a dent to Safaricoms client base. With amounts of money already invested in their infrastructure not forgetting the numbers of their clients locked by their MPESA product, it will take more than the price war Celtel has embarked to acquire a significant chunk from Safaricom. AS for the expected entrant ECONET, they will need more than a miracle to cause any nightmares to safaricom given the head start Safaricom has alreday given them
A down turn in our pre IPO expectation is that the company has indicated that they will pay dividends to their current share holders which excludes you and me i.e the Government, Vodafone and by extension regrettably Mobitelea. However the silver lining in this cloud being that they are getting a lower dividend, 2B down from the 4B they got last year so the withheld profit will go into making Safaricom earn us more money next year.
I am assuming a very bullish position in this stock and will buy it at even 15ksh once it hits the bourse
With a PBT profit of about 20B and an PAT profit of 13.8B giving it an earning of 0.345Ksh considering that their issued shares stand at 40B. This means that the company will in a weeks time enter the NSE at PE ratio of 14.5 at least for the local investor segment. With their growth potential the stock enters as among the cheapest within the commercial and services segment at NSE
Though their subscriber growth rate appears to be flattening and future new customers expected to have lower Average Revenue per User[ARPU], their new services continue to baffle many. In the month of March alone 3billion was transferred through their MPESA service. They have also embarked on an aggressive campaign to capture a significant market share in the Internet business through their broadband modem router.
In essence what this mans is that safaricom is combining services provided by, banking, mobile telephony and ICT all rolled into one. Given the growth potential of all these sectors safaricom appears like it will be one company to watch carefully.
In the mobile telephony though they anticipate strong competition, their competitors have one heck of a job to do to really cause a dent to Safaricoms client base. With amounts of money already invested in their infrastructure not forgetting the numbers of their clients locked by their MPESA product, it will take more than the price war Celtel has embarked to acquire a significant chunk from Safaricom. AS for the expected entrant ECONET, they will need more than a miracle to cause any nightmares to safaricom given the head start Safaricom has alreday given them
A down turn in our pre IPO expectation is that the company has indicated that they will pay dividends to their current share holders which excludes you and me i.e the Government, Vodafone and by extension regrettably Mobitelea. However the silver lining in this cloud being that they are getting a lower dividend, 2B down from the 4B they got last year so the withheld profit will go into making Safaricom earn us more money next year.
I am assuming a very bullish position in this stock and will buy it at even 15ksh once it hits the bourse
Monday, March 17, 2008
SAFRICOM: A MUST HAVE
First, my apologies for going under for quite a while. But with the murderous orgy we experienced after the elections one may be forgiven for losing interest in certain things. I guess with the impending mother of all IPO's my remergence can never be more timely.
Company Listing price Listing PE ratio Current price Current PE
Kengen 11.90 10.70 26.00 23.00
Scan group 10.45 10.45 28.25 23.35
Access 10.00 16.40 25.75 35.00
Eveready 9.50 15.80 7.50 12.5
KenyaRe 9.5 14.62 14.15 22.50
You must note that the above datum has been derived with the market at it’s lowest due to the anticipated Safaricom IPO and after a stint of under performance due to post election violence.
My take; sprint for this stock. For Short termers be cautioned that the 10 Billion shares being offered might be enough to quench the hunger for Safaricom chunk of ownership either by the QII’s or the certificate framing investors to not have a post IPO price rally but for long term the growth potential of Safaricom is unparalleled with the communication sector still being the leading growth area in developing economies.
Disclaimer: some facts and wordings sourced from the net
Safaricom IPO is finally here. As we wait for the Safaricom prospectus expected in the next two weeks just before the offer begins (28th March),let me indulge on some preliminary analysis based on available facts
- The government is offloading 25% of Safaricom[or is it it's 60% share holding? This should get clearer from the prospectus] worth Ksh 50 B.This means Safaricom(100% )is worth KSH200B
- The total number of shares on offer are 10B at Ksh 5 per share (This means that the total number of issued shares are 40B of which 10B will be listed (25%))
- The allocation will be classified into two categories: Domestic investors (East Africans) and International institutional investors.
- The price for East Africans is fixed at Ksh 5 but for the international institutional investors, it will be determined via a book building process(That means foreigners may have to buy it at a higher price than Ksh 5 per share which would be a good signal of the anticipated opening price on June 9 when the shares begin trading in the NSE)
- 65% of the offered shares are reserved for East African residents-Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda and Burundi. This means the 'East Africans' will need to raise KSH 32.5B.
- In case the domestic investors(East Africans) oversubscribe their category by more than 200%,there is a provision that 15% of the shares reserved for the international pool will be clawed back to the domestic pool
- This means that if the domestic pool raises Ksh 65B ( 200% of domestic category),then the shares to be allocated to this category will be 80% of the total offer(ie 8B shares Worth Ksh 40B).
- This method will ensure that one can expect to be allocated at least 60% of applied for shares in the event of a 200% oversubscription in the domestic category(40/65 x 100%=61.5%)
- Safaricom in Year ended 2006 made a Net profit of KSH 12B.This means an Earnings per share (EPS) of: KSH 12B/40B = KSH 0.30
The share is therefore being offered at P/E of :KSH5/KSH 0.3=16.66 - The rumored Gross profit for year ended 2007 is KSH 21B(Net Profit KSH 14.7B)This means the shares are actually being offered at an EPS of KSH 0.3675 and P/E of 13.6.
The financial year for Safaricom ends in March. The begging question is whether the dividends for year ending March 2008 will be accruing to the government or to the new shareholders. I strongly believe the latter will be the case. I suspect the year end results will be announced sometime in May before the shares hit the market in June. It will be interesting to see in the prospectus the dividend policy Safaricom aims to put in place.
The share is not only well priced based on the unit price Ksh 5,but also well priced based on its P/E. The limiting of the foreign allocation to 35% (or 20% in case of a >200% oversubscription in the domestic category) ensures that Post IPO, the share will receive sustained demand from foreigners as they will want to up their shareholding.
Though this IPO is like no other in terms of size it would be instructive to compare it with other recent IPO’s in order to logically predict the direction this stock might take after listing
Company Listing price Listing PE ratio Current price Current PE
Kengen 11.90 10.70 26.00 23.00
Scan group 10.45 10.45 28.25 23.35
Access 10.00 16.40 25.75 35.00
Eveready 9.50 15.80 7.50 12.5
KenyaRe 9.5 14.62 14.15 22.50
You must note that the above datum has been derived with the market at it’s lowest due to the anticipated Safaricom IPO and after a stint of under performance due to post election violence.
My take; sprint for this stock. For Short termers be cautioned that the 10 Billion shares being offered might be enough to quench the hunger for Safaricom chunk of ownership either by the QII’s or the certificate framing investors to not have a post IPO price rally but for long term the growth potential of Safaricom is unparalleled with the communication sector still being the leading growth area in developing economies.
Disclaimer: some facts and wordings sourced from the net
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