Dankotuwa shares reach new heights

Dankotuwa Porcelain (DPL) shares which closed last Thursday at Rs 21.00 started on Monday at Rs 24.00 thereby reaching a high of Rs 46.50 and finally settled at Rs 39.50.

It surpassed its all time high price of Rs 37.75 in 1995 as retail investors churned 19.6 million shares. This is more than the 13.5 million deposited with the Central Depository Systems of the Colombo Stock Exchange and close to 81 percent of the total shares in issue.

Dankotuwa Porcelain (DPL) got a new lease of life courtesy of Environmental Resources Investments (ERI) and Ceylon Leather Products (CLPL) and its share reached new heights.

ERI shares closed at Rs 73.25, up Rs 3.25 while CLPL closed at Rs 233.00, down Rs 3.00. The broader market index the ASPI closed down by 27 points (-0.6 percent) to finish the day at 4,574 while the more sensitive MPI lost 33 points (-0.6 percent) to close at 5,258 yesterday. The total turnover for the day was Rs 2.5 billion with Rs 670 million accounted for by DPL.

The other announcement of the day came from Sampath Bank which announced that it will issue a scrip dividend of shares at the ratio of one for every 120.7 shares in issue at the rate of Rs 3.00 per share from the profits of the bank for the financial year ending 2010. With this the number of shares will increase by 627,596 making it a total of 76.4 million shares. These 76.4 million shares will be split into two increasing the number of shares to Rs 152.8 million shares.

The company will also issue 3.1 million shares to its employees at the rate of Rs 80.00 per share. Sampath bank closed the day at Rs 365.00.

First Guardian Equities