adminFidelity Life Assurance jumping from US2,2c to US12c, a 446 percent year to date gain.
Fidelity has been on the rampage in the first half of the year, buoyed by a good set of results and the recapitalisation exercise beginning to bear fruit.
Cable manufacturing firm, Cafca was in second place gaining 269 percent to trade at US59c after opening the year at US16c.
Investors are also interested in the counter after management repaid all its borrowings in 2010.
They are expected to resort to short-term borrowing to finance working capital.
On the other hand, blue chip counters such as Delta gained 23 percent from US65c to US79,99c while Econet was in the negative territory after starting the year at US477c, to close yesterday’s trading at US471c, representing a loss of 1,26 percent.
Dual-listed PPC is also trading in the negative territory after losing 8,06 percent to trade at US331c from US360c at the beginning of the year.
Innscor was the biggest gainer among blue chips, putting on 30 percent from US50c to US60c.
Analysts said it is high time local investors moved in to the second-tier counters which have potential to push share prices up.
“Who thought Fidelity would be trading at US12c now, after opening the year at US2,2c?” said a local stockbroker.
“Now everyone is saying: ‘I should have bought Fidelity’. We can still invest in these other counters which are deemed non-performers,”
During the period under review, tightly-held Radar was in the third place, doubling its initial price to US45c.
Clothing retail chain, Truworths was in fourth place after gaining 101,43 percent on the opening price of US3,50c to close yesterday’s trading at US7,05c.
Clothing manufacturing and retail firms have benefited as prices of clothes are anticipated to rise, driven by firming international prices of cotton lint – this has translated to sustained earnings growth.
Tractive Power Holdings anchored the bottom of the top five gainers to trade at US14,50c from US6c.
But Starafrica has continued to sing the blues, becoming the biggest loser on the ZSE, dropping its value by a phenomenal 85 percent from US7c to US1,01c.
Starafrica shareholders have lost about US$8 million since the beginning of the year – the company was valued at about US$13 million in January this year.
The group now valued at about US$5,1 million has 517 607 667 shares in issue.
Starafrica’s problems started when its subsidiary, Red Star was operating at a loss failing to break even.
Post dollarisation, Red Star failed to raise US$15 million to restock the group with a view to raise capacity utilisation from an average of 33 percent to about 70 percent.
Starafrica has also failed to return to profitability despite completing a successful recapitalisation exercise last year.
Chemco, expected to delist from the bourse, lost 73,33 percent to US12c from US45c.
The group has already disposed of its two non-core businesses and closed two other loss-making divisions, Chemco Transport and FarmARama to improve group earnings.
Chemco also indicated that rationalisation of the business activities will continue during the second half of the year and further non-core assets have been identified for disposal.
Caps, also seeking shareholder approval to delist, was on the negative side, losing 56 percent from US1c to US0, 10c.
Gulliver and Interfresh lost 52 and 50 percent to trade at US0, 10c and US0, 2c respectively.
Online Reporter