Mauritius’s Semdex drops 3.5%

Mauritian stocks headed for their lowest close in almost eight months and the rupee slid to a three-week low, as concern about a slowing global economy prompted investors to turn away from emerging market assets.

The 38-member SEMDEX gauge of the official market declined as much as 3.9 percent, and was down 2.5 percent at 1,894.14 at 12:56 p.m., in Port Louis, the capital. A close at this level will be the lowest since November 2010, according to Bloomberg data. The currency of the Indian Ocean island nation depreciated for a fifth consecutive day against the dollar, weakening 0.1 percent to 28.1550 per dollar, its lowest since Aug. 8.

The drop in Mauritian stocks was led by New Mauritius Hotels Ltd. (NMH), the country’s largest leisure operator by market value, which slumped 5.9 percent or 5.5 rupees to 88 rupees. State Bank of Mauritius Ltd. (SBM), the island’s second-largest lender by market value, retreated 2.8 percent, or 2.5 rupees, to 87.5 rupees.

European stocks are on their longest losing since streak since 2003, dropping for an eighth day, and Asian shares fell, following Standard & Poor’s downgrade of its U.S rating to AA+, debt turmoil in major economies and rising inflation in China.

“Markets are waking up to the stark reality that the global economy is in worse shape than previously thought”, analysts at Mauritius Commercial Bank said in an e-mailed research note today. “In the short to medium term, fear is expected to drive markets”.

Mauritius, with a population of 1.3 million people, is an open-market economy, with almost two thirds of arriving tourists coming from Europe. Europe is also the biggest buyer of locally manufactured exports, according to the Central Statistics Office. While 41 percent of the country’s foreign currency income is in euros, about 67 percent of its import costs are in dollars, according to the Bank of Mauritius.

Buying prices for the dollar were from 27.3711 to 27.5362 rupees, with the selling price declining to 28.8366 from 28.7504 rupees per dollar, according to rates published on the Bank of Mauritius website today.