Kenya's stock exchange plans East Africa's first AI-focused ETF

NAIROBI, Aug 5 : Kenya's Nairobi Securities Exchange is creating East Africa's first AI stocks-focused exchange-traded fund, which it plans to offer to investors before year-end, its CEO said. The Nairobi market attracts a sizeable proportion of foreign equity investors given its profitable banking sector and telecoms operator Safaricom, but it does not currently offer exposure to AI stocks."We want essentially to be able to bring a product to our market where the underlying basket is a reflection of companies that have a direct exposure to AI," Frank Mwiti told Reuters.Companies like Microsoft, Anthropic and OpenAI could be used as references for the ETF, he added. Kenyan investors can already access AI-related products abroad, but the NSE wants to make it easier for them to trade locally