By Santhosh V Perumal
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Qatar Exchange yesterday opened the week on a stronger note to cross the 12,000 mark, mainly supported by buying interests from local retail investors.
Heavy demand — especially for consumer goods, insurance, telecom, realty and transport equities — led the 20-stock Qatar Index (based on price index) gain for the ninth straight session by 0.96% to 12,098.46 points.
Amid their lower exposure, foreign institutions continued to be bullish, but with lesser vigour in the bourse, which is up 16.56% year-to-date.
Trading volumes surged and was skewed mainly towards telecom, real estate, banking, industrials and consumer goods sectors.
The index that tracks Shariah-principled stocks was seen to considerably outperform the other indices in the bourse.
The 20-stock Total Return Index gained 0.96% to 17,995.3 points, All Share Index (with wider constituents) by 0.97% to 3,105.27 and Al Rayan Islamic Index by 2.49% to 3,796.25 points.
All the three indices factored in dividend income as well.
Consumer goods stocks shot up 3.79%, insurance (3.17%), telecom (2.07%), realty (1.25%), transport (0.99%), industrials (0.72%) and banks and financial services (0.3%).
About 83% of the stocks extended gains with major movers being Vodafone Qatar, Mazaya Qatar, United Development Company, Ezdan, Gulf International Services, Qatari Investors Group, Mesaieed Petrochemical Holding, Woqod, Qatar Islamic Bank, Doha Bank, Masraf Al Rayan and Widam Food.
However, Industries Qatar, QNB and al khaliji were seen to buck the trend.
Market capitalisation rose 0.73%, or about QR5bn to QR673.32bn. Small, micro, mid and large cap equities gained 2.37%, 2.16%, 1.28% and 0.44%, respectively.
Qatari retail investors’ net selling fell to QR2.97mn against QR72.28mn last Thursday.
Foreign institutions’ net buying amounted to QR31.94mn compared to QR85.61mn the previous trading day.
Domestic institutions turned net sellers to the extent of QR13.89mn against net buyers of QR2.23mn last Thursday.
Non-Qatari individual investors’ net profit taking was QR14.96mn, compared to QR15.64mn the previous trading day.
Total trading volume zoomed 94% to 38.18mn stocks, value by 65% to QR1.19bn and transactions by 50% to 12,876.
The telecom sector’s trading volume grew more than five-fold to 13.05mn equities and value more than quadrupled to QR207.89mn on more than tripled deals to 1,918.
The industrials sector’s trading volume more than doubled to 4.61mn shares and value also more than doubled to QR289.33mn on a 62% jump in transactions to 3,558.
Although the transport sector witnessed more than doubling of trading volume to 0.84mn stocks, its value surged 46% to QR23.01mn and deals by 45% to 378.
The real estate sector’s trading volume shot up 79% to 8.22mn equities, value by 78% to QR182.73mn and transactions by 58% to 2,046.
The market witnessed 66% surge in consumer goods sector’s trading volume to 3.47mn shares, 51% in value to QR196.46mn and 47% in deals to 1,753.
The banks and financial services sector reported 2% gain in trading volume to 7.68mn stocks, while value fell 3% to QR271.57mn. Transactions were up 10% to 2,976.
However, the insurance sector’s trading volume tanked 36% to 0.3mn equities; value by 9% to QR16.35mn and deals by 6% to 247.
In the debt market, there was no trading of treasury bills and government bonds.
Abu Dhabi’s Aldar at four-year high; Egypt hits eight-week low
Abu Dhabi’s Aldar Properties hit a four-year high yesterday after it unveiled tentative plans to float a subsidiary, lifting the emirate’s bourse, while Egypt’s market slumped to an eight-week low.
Other Middle East markets were muted as Saudi Arabia investors showed little reaction to a slew of first-quarter earnings, and Dubai eased from Thursday’s five-year peak.
In Abu Dhabi, Aldar surged 5.1% to its highest close since May 2010. The state-run developer said it might float property management unit Khidmah through an initial public offer sometime in coming years.
RAK Properties, a favourite target for retail investors’ speculation, climbed 14.5%, while Abu Dhabi’s main index rose 0.9% to a five-week high.
Neighbouring Dubai eased 0.6%, its first decline in six sessions. Emaar Properties and Dubai Financial Market were the main drags, sliding 1.7 and 2.0% respectively.
In Saudi Arabia, Almarai fell 0.8% after the dairy firm posted a 7.3% increase in first-quarter profit that was marginally below analysts’ estimates.
Saudi Hollandi Bank’s 20% rise in first- quarter profit helped the lender’s shares end only 0.8% higher.
The bank “will maintain double-digit growth in net profit in 2014 and 2015 and will outperform peers”, NBK Capital wrote in a note, adding however that the stock’s sustained surge — it has gained 79% since the start of 2013 — meant it had limited upside.
Riyad Bank rose 0.3% after the kingdom’s third-largest lender by assets said it made a first-quarter profit of 1.08bn riyals ($288mn), up 13.5% from a year earlier.
Egypt’s main index dropped 2.3% to its lowest close since February 11. The benchmark has fallen 14.7% from March 26’s five-year closing high.
The sell-off came after Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said he would run for president; investors, most of whom favour Sisis, had bid up the market ahead of the announcement and took profits afterwards. The market is still up 10.9% year-to-date.
“Investors are bearish in the short term,” said Mohamed Radwan, head of equities at Pharos Securities in Cairo.
“The most hammered stocks are the retail favourites, while the blue chips are suffering as well.”
Telecom Egypt fell 9.4%, Citadel Capital slid 9.2% and property developer Talaat Moustafa dropped 8.5%.
“Local institutions are selling on fears of further declines in the market,” added Radwan. “The (Sisi) announcement was the trigger for people to think the market was over-bought.”
A gradual weakening of the Egyptian pound to multi-month lows against the US dollar in recent days has also hurt market sentiment, reviving talk that Egypt may eventually have to depreciate its currency further to stimulate growth.
Elsewhere, in Kuwait the index edged up 0.1% to 7,583 points and the Bahrain index rose 0.5% to 1,374 points.