By Santhosh V Perumal/Business Reporter
The Qatar Stock Exchange yesterday inched near the 12,500 mark, mainly on higher net buying interests from foreign institutions.
An above average buying pressure in the telecom, real estate and banking counters led the 20-stock Qatar Index (based on price data) gain 1.07% to 12,453.86 points.
The index that tracks Shariah-principled stocks was seen gaining faster than the other indices in the bourse, which is up 19.98% year-to-date.
Trading volumes rose and was mainly towards telecom, realty, banking, industrials and consumer goods equities.
The 20-stock Total Return Index gained 1.07% to 18,571.4 points, the All Share Index (with wider constituents) by 0.76% to 3,214.61 and the Al Rayan Islamic Index by 1.95% to 4,042.57 points. All the three indices factored in dividend income as well.
Telecom stocks appreciated 2.28%, followed by real estate (1.37%), banks and financial services (1.35%), insurance (1.14%) and consumer goods (0.73%), while industrials and transport fell 0.52% and 0.25% respectively.
About 60% of the stocks returned gains with major movers being Vodafone Qatar, Qatar Islamic Bank, Commercial Bank, Doha Bank, International Islamic, Masraf Al Rayan, United Development Company, Barwa and Nakilat.
However, Industries Qatar, QNB, Qatari Investors Group, Aamal Company, Mesaieed Petrochemical Holding and Ezdan bucked the trend.
Market capitalisation was up 0.25%, or about QR2bn, to QR718.27bn.
Foreign institutions’ net buying rose to QR83.55mn against QR44.86mn on Tuesday.
Domestic institutions’ net profit-booking, however, surged to QR29.37mn compared to QR0.76mn the previous day.
Qatari retail investors’ net selling was up to QR28.64mn against 27.11mn on Tuesday.
Non-Qatari individual investors’ net profit-booking strengthened to QR25.61mn compared to QR16.91mn the previous day.
Total trading volume rose 35% to 35.16mn stocks, value by 21% to QR1.4bn and transactions by less than 1% to 12,111.
The telecom sector’s trading volume grew about seven-fold to 11.34mn equities and value by about five-fold to QR189.98mn on about five-fold jump in deals to 1,802.
The insurance sector’s trading volume more than doubled to 0.4mn shares and value also more than doubled to QR22.79mn on a 49% rise in transactions to 281.
The banks and financial services sector reported 49% surge in trading volume to 6.76mn stocks, 56% in value to QR347.29mn and 29% in deals to 3,227.
The real estate sector’s trading volume expanded 25% to 10.32mn equities and value by 25% to QR263.77mn but on a 3% fall in transactions to 2,468.
However, the market witnessed a 54% plunge in the industrials sector’s trading volume to 2.31mn shares, 46% in value to QR147.79mn and 41% in deals to 2,437.
The transport sector’s trading volume plummeted 49% to 1.08mn stocks, value by 42% to QR35.88mn and transactions by 41% to 559.
The consumer goods sector saw its trading volume tank 30% to 2.95mn equities but value was up less than 1% to QR130.81mn. Deals were down 7% to 1,337.
