By Santhosh V Perumal
Business Reporter
Saudi Arabia’s $93bn handout largely masked the political risks, prompting increased buying by foreign institutions in Gulf bourses. The Qatar Exchange (QE) stood fifth in performance among the seven regional bourses during the week.
QE gained 1.49% vis-à-vis Dubai’s gain of 5.52%, Saudi Arabia’s 4.82%, Muscat’s 2.11% and Abu Dhabi’s 1.86%. Bahrain and Kuwait bourses could gain only 0.57% and 0.34% respectively in the week that saw the Doha bourse announcing that it expected the listing of debts, initially with sovereign bonds, by the second quarter of this year.
Doha’s 20-stock benchmark added 122 points to 8,307.85 points mainly on banking, industrial and services counters in the week that saw the opening of the country’s first credit bureau as part of strengthening the asset quality of banks and financial institution.
Year-to-date (ytd) QE is down 4.31%, Kuwait falling by 9.64%, Muscat (-5.22%), Dubai (-4.77%), Saudi Arabia (-3.9%), Abu Dhabi (-3.2%) and Bahrain (0.68%).
Among the influential movers in the QE were Masraf Al Rayan, Commercialbank, Doha Bank, Qatar Islamic Bank, Industries Qatar (IQ), National Leasing and Nakilat in the week that saw a Qatar Central Bank data which found the country’s banking industry’s non-performing loans and provisions towards those registering upward growth, even as capital adequacy largely remained unchanged and well above the stipulated level in the last three years up to 2010.
The banking and insurance sector witnessed the maximum buying as its group index gained 1.66%, services (1.43%), industry (1.15%) and insurance (0.77%) in the review week that also saw Gulf Warehousing Company increasing its capital to QR396.34mn upon its acquisition of Agility Qatar.
However, stocks of services, insurance, lenders and industry have returned ytd losses of 6.01%, 5.39%, 3.65% and 2.66% respectively.
Of the 43 stocks; 28 rose, while 13 fell and one was unchanged. Another one was not traded in the week. Six of the nine lenders, three of the five insurers, five of the seven industries and 14 of the 23 services closed lower.
However, large, small, mid and micro caps have lost ytd 13.18%, 12.03%, 6.87% and 2.58% respectively.
Foreign institutions turned bullish that they were net buyers to the tune of 8.37% against net sellers of 0.46% in the previous week.
A higher 23.47% of them bought stocks compared with 19.13% in the week ended March 17; while a lower 15.1% offloaded against 19.59%.
Domestic institutions, on the other hand, turned profit takers as they were net sellers to the extent of 5.83% compared with net buyers of 0.78% in the previous week.
A lower 20.56% of them were into buying against 22.69% in the week ended March 17; while a higher 26.39% were into selling compared with 21.91%.
Qatari retail investors were also bearish that they were net sellers to the tune of 2.02% against net buyers of 0.18% in the previous week.
A lower 42.58% of them purchased equities against 45.06% in the week ended March 17 and a marginally lower 44.6% sold against 44.88%.
Non-Qatari individual investors’ bearish grip marginally strengthened as their net selling rose to 0.52% from 0.5% in the previous week.
A marginally higher 13.39% of them were into buying against 13.12% in the week ended March 17 and a marginally higher 13.91% were into selling compared with 13.62%.
The price-to-book value was 1.84 times at the end of fourth week of March compared with 2.11 in the year-ago period.
Total trading volume fell 26% to 48.88mn shares, value by 19% to QR1.85bn and transactions by 9% to 29,175.
Services dominated the trading ring as its equities accounted for 55.28%, 44.32% and 51.56% of total trading volume, value and deals respectively (against 62.14%, 53.71% and 56.3% in the previous week).
Banks and financial institution accounted for 35.07% of total volume (30.30% a week ago), industry 8.24% (6.29%) and insurance 1.41% (1.27%).
The services’ trading volume plummeted 34% to 27.02mn shares, insurance’s by 18% to 0.69mn, lenders’ by 14% to 17.14mn and industry’s by 3% to 4.03mn.
The banks and financial institution’s cornered 38.92% of total stocks trading value (compared to 31% in the previous week), industry 14.59% (13.54%) and insurance 1.62% (1.75%).
The services sector witnessed a 33% plunge in stocks trading value to QR821.96mn, industry by 13% to QR269.04mn and insurance by 4% to QR34.04mn; while lenders saw a 1% jump to QR720.03mn.
Rayan accounted for 12.6% of total trading value, followed by Barwa (11.7%) and IQ (11.61%)
The banks and financial institution’s share in total stock transaction stood at 33.68% (compared to 29.22% a week ago), industry 12.66% (12.1%) and insurance 2.1% (2.37%).
Deals within insurance fell 20% to 613, services by 17% to 15,044 and industry by 5% to 3,693; while those within lenders gained 4% to 9,825.