Twenty-one firms listed on the Ghana Stock Exchange (GSE) lost value in their respective shares in 2019.

This means investor clients of these equities have lost some amount of their investments.

The poor performance of the Accra Bourse also culminated in a 7.11% reduction in the market capitalisation of the GSE to GHS56.7 billion in 2019. 

For the second consecutive year, the GSE has performed poorly, a situation attributable to some challenges in the financial sector where many depositors have lost their investments.

In December 2018, the market capitalisation stood at GHS60.73 billion.

According to trading results from the GSE, the GSE Composite Index – which measures the entire value of shares listed on the Accra Bourse – lost value of 12.25% while the GSE Financial Stock Index – which tracks only the performance of financial stocks – declined in value by 6.23%.

Out of the 21 firms, the worst-performing stocks were SIC (-57.89%), ETI (-50.0%), Fanmilk (-48.50%), GOIL (-45.51%) and BOPP (-43.81%). 

They are now trading at 8 pesewas, 8 pesewas, GHS4.12, GHS1.70, and GHS2.86 per share, respectively.

Other stocks that also lost some value were Enterprise Insurance (-26.34%), Guinness Ghana Breweries Limited (-22.48%), Republic Bank (-18.84%), Total (-11.76%) and Unilever (-7.76%).

Regarding financial stocks, eight out of 12 stocks registered losses. 

They include Ecobank Transnational Incorporated (-50.0%), ADB (-14.96), CAL (-43.81) and Standard Chartered Bank (-12.38%).

The best-performing stocks were Trust Bank Gambia (73.91%), Access Bank (40.85%), Aluworks (25.00%), Ayrton Drugs (14.29%) and GCB Bank (10.87%). 

Their stocks are currently pegged at 4 pesewas, GHS5.00, 10 pesewas, 8 pesewas and GHS5.10 per share.

No Initial Public Offer was executed during the year under review, primarily due to the challenges that the market faced.  

However, ADB raised some GHS146 million via rights issue.

There are 38 listed firm on the GSE, both the the main and the SME market.