The S&P/ASX 200 Index (ASX: XJO) is not having a great start to the week today. At the time of writing, the flagship ASX index is down a substantial 1.61% to 7,250 points. With such a hefty drop, surely there must be some lively trading going on the ASX boards today.
So let's take a look at the most active ASX 200 shares trading by volume:
The 3 most active ASX 200 shares today
Zip Co Ltd (ASX: Z1P)
Zip Co is proving to be a very popular ASX 200 share on the markets today, with 9.14 million shares having traded so far. Zip shares are currently defying the broader ASX 200 gloom, and are up 1.72% to $8.28 so far today.
There has been no other major news or announcements out of Zip as of this afternoon. However, the buy now, pay later (BNPL) company was one of the best ASX 200 performers last week. It's also worth noting that, as my Fool colleague covered earlier today, Zip is also currently one of the ASX 200's most shorted shares.
AMP Ltd (ASX: AMP)
Wealth manager AMP is also making its presence known on the ASX 200 today, with a meaningful 14.4 million shares swapping hands so far. This is likely being assisted by the dismal performance of the AMP share price today. Unlike Zip, investors seem to be leaning into the general market sentiment with AMP today. Its shares are currently down a nasty 6.02% to $1.17 a share. That's not too far away from the company's all-time low of $1.05.
It's not entirely clear why investors are offloading AMP since there has been no major news or announcements out of the company recently. However, most ASX financial shares are performing very poorly today.
Boral Limited (ASX: BLD)
Construction company Boral is the most popular ASX 200 share on the markets today, with 23.9 million shares changing owners so far. Boral has had a very interesting day so far. It opened very strongly, pushing up as high as 3% to $7.06 this morning – a new 52-week high. It has since given up much of those gains but is still up 1.04% to $6.83 at the time of writing.
It's possible that this bouncing around has something to do with the sheer volume of shares trading today, as ASX 200 investors try and find the pricing that they find acceptable. Another factor at play could be the announcement of Boral's planned sale of its American building products division to a subsidiary of Westlake Chemical Corporation (NYSE: WLK) for US$2.15 billion, which we discussed earlier this morning.
