EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
During this 1st quarter of 2024, the activity of listed companies evolved within a general context marked by: (1) The decline in inflation to 1.2% on average, (2) Unfavorable weather conditions leading to a contraction of Crop Value Added by -3.9%, (3) The announcements of several pro-jects within the framework of AFCON 2025, the World Cup 2030, the rehabilitation of Al-Haouz region and finally, (4) The launch of the direct housing support program.
Upon the analysis of listed companies’ operational achievements, we emerge with the following conclusions:
- The growth in market revenue of +4.0% in Q1-24 was driven by the banking sector, whose aggregate NBI showed an increase of +21.6% (MAD +3.9 Bn). Excluding this sector, the Equity market shows a drop in revenue of -1.7% at the end of the said period;
- Quarterly market achievements hide certain disparities. More than 40% of listed compa-nies showed a drop in their revenue in Q1-24, i.e. 28 companies. Note that this level aver-aged 1/3 over the last 4 quarters. A situation which could be explained by the impact of the drop in inflation on sales prices as well as the delay in the achievements of some invest-ment projects;
- Despite the quality of its achievements in recent quarters, the banking sector still trades at valuation multiples that are more than 30% lower than those of the non-financial sectors, i.e. a P/E 24E of 15.1x compared to 23.1x respectively.
A paradoxical situation which, in our opinion, should be readjusted through a catching-up effect of the “performance” of banking stocks combined with a “profit-taking” effect at the level of non-financial sectors;
- Finally, and upon reading the issuers' press releases, we note a general "optimism" re-garding the improvement of their activity indicators starting H2-2024. This would result from a more dynamic Demand due to of the effective execution of the various investment projects announced.
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