By Santhosh V. Perumal/Business Reporter
Qatar Exchange was back in positive trajectory yesterday with its key index gaining a robust 1.10% to inch nearer the 8,500 mark mainly on foreign institutions’ buying support.
Traders at the exchange
In spite of profit booking by local retail and institutions, the 20-stock benchmark added 93 points to close at four-week high of 8,490.81 points. The market is however down 2.20% year-to-date.
Qatar Navigation, Doha Bank, Qatar Islamic Bank (QIB), QNB, Commercialbank and Industries Qatar were among the prime gainers.
The services index gained the maximum of 1.37%, followed by banks (1.09%), insurance (0.73%) and industry (0.68%).
Market capitalisation vaulted 1.28% or about QR6bn at QR450.20bn with mid, micro and large cap equities gaining 1.94%, 1.61% and 0.82% respectively; even as small caps lost 0.08%.
Of the 42 stocks, 30 advanced, while only eight declined, three were unchanged and one was not traded.
Foreign institutions turned bullish - they were net buyers to the tune of 4.26% against net sellers at 24.12% on the previous day.
A higher 29.46% of them were into buying compared to 20.98% on Wednesday whereas a much lower 25.20% were into selling against 45.10%.
However, domestic institutions turned profit takers - they were net sellers to the extent of 1.57% compared with net buyers of 15.70% the previous day.
A much lower 19.48% of them bought equities against 30.36% on Wednesday while a higher 21.05% of them sold compared to 14.66%.
Qatari individual investors also turned bearish that they were net sellers to the tune of 0.28% against net buyers of 10.69% in the previous day.
A higher 39.26% of them purchased equities against 37.56% on Wednesday but a much higher 39.54% sold compared to 26.87%.
Non-Qatari retail investors were increasingly profit takers as their net selling rose to 2.41% from 2.27% in the previous day.
A marginally higher 11.80% of them were into buying against 11.10% on Wednesday and a marginally higher 14.21% were into offloading compared to 13.37%.
Total trading volume more than doubled to 7.11mn equities, value also more than doubled to QR308.73mn on more than doubled deals to 4,959.
The banks’ trading volume soared 153% to 2.91mn equities, value by 150% to QR151.16mn and transactions by 160% to 1,966.
The services sector’s trading volume shot up 127% to 3.52mn shares, value by 104% to QR119.94mn and deals by 108% to 2,378.
The industrial sector’s trading volume expanded 117% to 0.63mn shares, value by 15% to QR35.46mn and transactions by 55% to 556.
The insurance sector’s trading volume was up 25% to 0.05mn shares whereas value fell 20% to QR2.18mn. Deals rose 16% to 59.
Actively traded stocks (in terms of volume) were Barwa (1.02mn shares); Masraf Al Rayan (1.01mn); Doha Bank (991,382); Nakilat (935,163) and QIB (284,972).