The transport, real estate and industrials counters witnessed higher than average demand in the main market, whose year-to-date losses truncated marginally to 8.81%.
The domestic funds were increasingly net buyers in the main bourse, whose capitalisation however was down QR0.4bn or 0.07% to QR568.11bn with microcap segments losing the most.
The Gulf retail investors turned bullish, albeit at lower levels in the main market, which however regained from an intraday low of 9,680 points, even as it touched an intraday high of 9,786 points.
The local retail investors’ weakened net buying had its influence on the main bourse, which saw as many as 6,425 exchange traded funds (sponsored by Masraf Al Rayan) valued at QR0.01mn trade across two deals.
The Gulf institutions’ lower net selling pressure had its say on the main market, which saw no trading of sovereign bonds.
The Islamic index was seen outperforming the main barometer in the other indices in the main bourse, which witnessed no trading of treasury bills.
The Total Return Index rose 0.14% and the All Islamic Index by 0.67%, while the All Share Index was down 0.03% in the main bourse, whose trade turnover and volumes were on the decline.
The transport sector index shot up 1.25%, realty (0.99%) and industrials (0.7%), while telecom declined 0.88%, banks and financial services (0.46%), insurance (0.27%) and consumer goods and services (0.19%).
Major gainers in the main market included Beema, Milaha, Qamco, Qatar Islamic Bank, Qatar Industrial Manufacturing, Doha bank, Qatar National Cement, Industries Qatar, Ezdan and Barwa.
In the venture market, Mahhar Holding saw its shares depreciate in value.
Nevertheless, Qatar General Insurance and Reinsurance, Commercial Bank, QNB, Ooredoo and Medicare Group were among the shakers in the main market. In the junior bourse, Al Faleh Educational Holding saw its shares appreciate in value.
The domestic institutions’ net buying strengthened markedly to QR21.56mn compared to QR16.54mn on December 12.
The Gulf individuals turned net buyers to the tune of QR0.25mn against net sellers of QR1.24mn the previous day.
The Gulf institutions’ net selling decreased significantly to QR28.94mn compared to QR47.59mn on Tuesday.
The local individual investors’ net profit booking shrank considerably to QR0.7mn against of QR14.65mn on December 12.
However, the foreign funds were net sellers to the extent of QR0.46mn compared with net buyers of QR37.38mn the previous day.
The foreign individual investors’ net buying weakened perceptibly to QR3.76mn against QR4.49mn on Tuesday.
The Arab individual investors’ net buying eased marginally to QR4.52mn compared to QR5.06mn on December 12.
The Arab institutions had no major net exposure for the sixth straight session.
Trade volumes in the main market were down 1% to 125.74mn shares, value by 8% to QR418.99mn and deals by 3% to 15,560.
The venture market saw 4% shrinkage in trade volumes to 0.44mn equities and 7% in value to QR0.39mn but on 35% jump in transactions to 70.