Stronger selling pressure, especially in insurance, real estate and transport counters, was witnessed on the Qatar Stock Exchange, which remained above 8,700 levels on Wednesday.
Local retail investors turned net sellers and there was substantially weakened buying interests from Gulf institutions as the 20-stock Qatar Index fell 0.16% to 8,707.67 points.
Masraf Al Rayan-sponsored exchange-traded fund QATR witnessed 0.22% decline; while Doha Bank sponsored QETF saw 0.2% gains.
However, foreign institutions turned bullish and there was weakened net selling by their domestic counterparts in the market, which is up 2.16% year-to-date.
Micro, small and midcap equities saw strong selling, leading to a 0.27% decline in capitalisation to QR478.43bn.
Trade turnover declined amidst higher volumes on the market, where telecom and banking sectors together accounted for about 65% of the total volume.
The Total Return Index fell 0.16% to 15,341.95 points, All Share Index by 0.45% to 2,558.84 points and Al Rayan Islamic Index (Price) by 0.21% to 2,208.68 points.
The insurance index declined 2.73%, realty (2.18%) and transport (1.87%); while telecom gained 0.62%, consumer goods (0.31%), banks and financial services (0.1%) and industrials (0.07%).
As much as three-fourth of the traded stocks was in the red with major losers being Qatar Insurance, Doha Insurance, Ezdan, Nakilat, Milaha, Mesaieed Petrochemical Holding, Barwa, Doha Bank, Qatar First Bank; whereas Vodafone Qatar, Commercial Bank, QIIB and Industries Qatar were among the gainers.
Local individual investors turned net sellers to the tune of QR3.34mn against net buyers of QR10.25mn on Tuesday.
The Gulf institutions’ net buying weakened influentially to QR0.1mn compared to QR10.83mn the previous day.
Non-Qatari individuals’ net buying declined perceptibly to QR4.53mn against QR4.93mn on April 3.
The Gulf individual investors’ net buying weakened marginally to QR0.26mn compared to QR0.83mn on Tuesday
However, non-Qatari institutions turned net buyers to the extent of QR6.44mn against net sellers of QR1.9mn the previous day.
Domestic funds’ net profit booking eased significantly to QR8.01mn compared to QR24.89mn on April 3.
Total trade volume rose 19% to 11.85mn shares, while value fell 10% to QR201.14mn and transactions by 25% to 3,169.
The market witnessed 66% plunge in the consumer goods sector’s trade volume to 0.13mn equities, 64% in value to QR10.22mn and 64% in deals to 158.
The real estate sector’s trade volume plummeted 33% to 1.71mn stocks, value by 35% to QR22.27mn and transactions by 44% to 453.
The industrials sector reported 26% shrinkage in trade volume to 1.56mn shares, 41% in value to QR29.44mn and 35% in deals to 628.
The banks and financial services sector’s trade volume was down 3% to 2.86mn equities, value by 8% to QR77.38mn and transactions by 24% to 979.
However, telecom sector’s trade volume almost tripled to 4.83mn stocks and value more than doubled to QR46.57mn on 53% increase in deals to 597.
The transport sector’s trade volume more than doubled to 0.63mn shares, value soared 63% to QR10.24mn and transactions by 20% to 244.
There was 75% surge in the insurance sector’s trade volume to 0.14mn equities to more than double value to QR5.02mn on 16% expansion in deals to 110.
In the debt market, there was no trading of treasury bills and sovereign bonds.
