The local market was quiet this week, with the NSX Local index down 0.21% at 623, and the NSX Overall Index up 0.43% at 1392. As at 25 June, Namibia Breweries was the largest local company on the exchange, with market capitalization of N$ 10 billion, followed by FirstRand Namibia with N$ 9.3 billion, Capricorn Investment Group with N$ 8.2 billion, and Trustco Group with N$ 7.6 billion. Agra lead the market this week with growth of 0.61% to close at N$ 1.65 per share. In terms of volume Trustco Group lead the market with N$ 805 thousand worth of shares traded, with FirstRand Namibia in second place with N$ 648 thousand worth of shares traded. The local currency gained 1.89% against the US Dollar, to close at N$ 14.37 per USD, and gained 0.87% against the British Pound, to close at N$ 18.23 per GBP. It closed at N$ 16.33 against the Euro, a gain of 0.35%.
The Namibia Statistics Agency released the GDP figures for the first quarter of 2019, and revealed that the economy had contracted by 2% during that quarter, compared to a contraction of 0.5% a year earlier. The sectors that contributed most to the contraction were the Construction, Wholesale &
retail trade, Agriculture & forestry as well as Hotels & restaurants sectors that recorded declines of 27.8%, 6.7%, 6.7% and 8.7%, respectively. However, during the first quarter, Namibia experienced a trade surplus for the first time since 2011, as imports had declined faster than exports.
