South African stocks extended gains into a third-straight session on Thursday, led by drug company Aspen Pharmacare and private hospital operator Mediclinic as optimistic investors continued to push into last year's strong performers. Sentiment was also boosted by minutes from a US Federal Reserve meeting that supported the view it will raise interest rates this year while weak data from the Eurozone reinforced sentiment that the European Central Bank could begin stimulus.
Aspen jumped 5.6 percent to finish at a record 431 rand, while Mediclinic rose 4.2 percent. "The market sees that these stocks have done very well in 2014 and clearly they have not finished their run yet," said Greg Katzenellenbogen, a director at Sanlam Private Wealth.
In December Africa's biggest generic drugmaker, Aspen, was one of four companies chosen to make HIV /AIDS treatment drugs in South Africa, a large contract in a country with one of the largest case loads of the viral disease. Aspen's shares were among the best performers last year, climbing almost 60 percent compared to the 6 percent rise of the benchmark Top-40 index. The bluechips index advanced 1.36 percent to 43,670. The broader All-Share index also gained 1.36 percent, to 49,595.
Iron ore producer Assore fell 1.5 percent, tracking the price of the steelmaking raw material on sentiment that prices were not likely to rise soon. The company was among the worst performers on the JSE last year, more than halving in value as the price of iron ore fell 47 percent in the period. Trade was lacklustre, with 129 million shares changing hands according to preliminary bourse data. That was lower than last year's daily average of 183 million shares.
Comments
Comments are closed.