Stock Market: Individuals Triple Their Transactions in the First Quarter of 2025

At the end of the first quarter of 2025, the investor landscape in the stock market remains characterized by a strong presence of institutional and corporate investors. This period has been marked by positive growth in the main activity indicators. With a transaction volume of 33.3 billion dirhams, the stock market, including its central and block segments, recorded an increase of 185.2% compared to the same period in 2024, which saw 11.7 billion dirhams. The quarterly performance of the indices rose by 20.2% for the MASI and 21.2% for the MASI 20. In this market context, the interventions of mutual funds (OPCVM) and Moroccan corporate entities in the central market's equity segment accounted for 66.7% of the transaction volume for the quarter. This was followed by individual Moroccan investors at 24.9%, foreign corporate entities at 4.2%, and investors transacting through the banking network at 3.9%. Regarding the nature of the transactions, the breakdown between purchases and sales reveals the following key observations: - Mutual funds, in a net buying position, made purchases amounting to 14.7 billion dirhams and sales valued at 8.8 billion dirhams. Compared to the same period in 2024, their purchases and sales increased by 3.2 times and 2.8 times, respectively. - Moroccan corporate entities, in a net selling position, executed sales worth 11.6 billion dirhams and purchases of approximately 7 billion dirhams. Compared to Q1 2024, their purchases and sales rose by 2.2 times and 3.6 times, respectively. - Individual Moroccan investors recorded sales that increased by 2.9 times compared to Q1 2024, reflecting a 64.6% rise from Q4 2024, totaling 7.9 billion dirhams. Their purchases were nearly equivalent at 7.7 billion dirhams, up by 2.8 times from Q1 2024 and 81.7% from Q4 2024. - Foreign corporate entities conducted sales of 1.7 billion dirhams, up from Q1 2024 (+69.3%) and Q4 2024 (+55.3%). Their purchases reached 957 million dirhams, marking increases of 87.3% from Q1 2024 and 31.7% from Q4 2024. - Investors whose orders pass through the banking network increased their purchases by 56.6% compared to Q4 2024 and by 3.2 times compared to Q1 2024. Sales also grew by 19.9% from Q4 2024 and 9.9% from Q1 2024. It is noteworthy that the flow of transactions in the central market concerning equity securities was driven by an increase in the number of stock orders, which rose by 85.9% compared to Q1 2024 and by 33.6% compared to Q4 2024, totaling 546,057 orders in Q1 2025. Correspondingly, the number of contracts surged by 100.4% from the first quarter of 2024 (141,193 contracts) to the first quarter of 2025 (282,947 contracts), and by 40.9% compared to the fourth quarter of 2024 (200,766 contracts). The majority of trading occurs in the central market, which accounted for 95% of total exchanges, with a volume of 31.6 billion dirhams. This represents a 177.3% increase compared to the first quarter of 2024 (11.4 billion dirhams) and a 56.0% rise compared to Q4 2024 (20.2 billion dirhams). The block market constituted 5% of total exchanges, with a volume of 1.7 billion dirhams.