‘Super September’ returns to Bourse

Monday, 1 October 2012 00:00 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

The Colombo stock market has got the benefit of the historically “bullish” month of September with rebound in sentiments giving it an extra boost.

The just ended September month saw the benchmark All Share Index (ASI) gain by 15% and the active Milanka Index by 17%.

Historically between 2002 and 2010, the month of September has been best performer on average except in 2008 whilst last year it dipped marginally given the overall bearish performance. The return of “Super September” was very much in mind of at least one broking firm, NDB Stockbrokers, which titled its Friday’s market report with same.

NDBS also said the Bourse ended the September month recording its highest monthly turnover for the year of Rs. 33.5 billion.

Considering the fact that CSE began September with a year to date dip of 15%, an equal percentage gain during the month is impressive. The sharp rise in September also comes with August seeing a 4.7% gain in ASI thanks to a late rally at the tail end of the month.

The rally in September has effectively reduced the ASI’s year to date negative return to 1.6% with most analysts expecting the Bourse graduating to positive return area this week. Last week a similar expectation was prevalent but a degree of profit taking checkmated the Bourse from gaining by over 2% to end the negative return era.

Last year ASI was down by 8.5% ending two years of world’s most consistent performance on account of 95% gain in 2010 and 125% jump in 2009.