Casablanca Stock Exchange: The real challenges for 2026

2025 ended with a transformed market, caught between bullish maturity and a rebalancing of forces. Indeed, the stock market trend observed in the last weeks of 2025 is not simply a technical end-of-year movement. It is the culmination of a bullish cycle that began much earlier, fueled by a combination of macroeconomic, institutional, and microeconomic factors that have gradually restored the Casablanca Stock Exchange to a central role in financing the economy. The sequence of IPOs of Cash Plus and then of SGTM acts as a revealing factor. The first IPO, spectacular in its immediate performance, rekindled the appetite of retail investors and confirmed the return of a certain appetite for risk. The second, due to its size, visibility, and strategic positioning, marks a more profound break.
According to market professionals, SGTM’s IPO is not only a successful IPO, it also marks the return of major structural transactions capable of expanding the market, strengthening overall capitalization, and repositioning Casablanca as a market capable of absorbing leading players. This momentum came amid an already solid market trend. With the Masi stock market index hovering around 19,000 points and annual performance close to 27%, the Casablanca market posted one of its best performances in more than a decade in 2025. This rise was not a one-off surge. It was built up gradually, with steadily improving volumes, market capitalization consistently exceeding MAD 1 trillion, and a gradual broadening of participation, particularly in banking, industrial, and service stocks.
On the macroeconomic front, the market benefited from a more predictable environment. The decision by the central bank (Bank Al-Maghrib) to keep its key interest rate unchanged, while revising its growth outlook upwards, helped to stabilize expectations. In an international context marked by uncertainty over the monetary trajectories of the major central banks, this visibility was a key factor in building confidence. The gradual easing of inflation, resilient domestic demand, and the recovery in public investment have strengthened the earnings outlook for listed companies.
Added to this is an often underestimated but decisive factor: the rise of market reforms. Projects relating to the transformation of the Casablanca Stock Exchange, the deepening of the capital market, the modernization of financial instruments, and the broadening of the investor base are beginning to produce tangible results.
Fédoua TOUNASSI