Qatar Stock Exchange (QSE) defied the overall bullish trend in the Gulf equity markets as it closed in the negative with midcap equities bearing the brunt most during the week.

Foreign institutions’ net selling pressure rather drove the local bourse down 1.87% during the week which saw global index compiler MSCI downgrade Vodafone Qatar to small caps, the effect of which was substantial.

Nevertheless, Bahrain saw its bourse vault 1.66%, Saudi Arabia 1.54%, Muscat 1.45%, Dubai 1.09%, Kuwait 0.57% and Abu Dhabi 0.22% during the week which also saw Qatar First Bank foray into Gulf Cooperation Council small caps index for the first time.

QSE also witnessed the highest year-to-date losses at 6.27% compared to 4.09% in Saudi Arabia, 2.93% in Bahrain, 1.84% in Kuwait and 0.35% in Abu Dhabi; while Dubai and Muscat gained 5.04% and 1.66% respectively.

The QSE was mainly dragged by real estate, telecom and insurance equities during the week, which saw United Development Company announce QR716mn worth new projects in its Pearl Qatar project.

Islamic stocks fell faster than the conventional scrips during the week which saw QSE to price the soon to be launched exchange traded funds at an indicative one-hundredth of the previous day’s close of indices.

However, the net selling pressure from local retail investors and domestic institutions were seen weakening and there was increased buying support from non-Qatari individuals during the week, which saw Commercial Bank shareholders approve the QR1.5bn rights issue.

Trade turnover and volumes were on the decline during the week which witnessed banking, telecom and realty sectors together constituted about 79% of the total volumes.

In volumes, the banks and financial services constituted 33% of the total, followed by telecom (27%), real estate (19%), insurance (8%), industrials (7%), consumer goods (4%) and transport (3%) during the week which saw Doha Bank announce that its 20% rights issue is to hit the market by the first half of 2017.

In value, banks and financial services’ share was 30%, followed by industrials (16%), telecom (15%), insurance (14%), realty (12%), consumer goods (11%) and transport (3%) during the week which witnessed Wermuth Asset Management view that the creditworthiness of Gulf countries may start to erode as oil demand could fall below 1% by 2018.

Opening the week weak at 9,872 points, the market was on a free fall for the next two days to touch a nadir of 9,680 points on Tuesday. Kamco had said in its technical analysis that a fall below 9,700 points would lead to 9,500 points and maybe further down to 9,200 points as weekly relative strength index indicator was currently looking bearish, while the daily one is also negative but resides in the oversold territory.

However, the markets disregarded that notion to report gains for the subsequent two days but overall it settled 186 points lower during the week which saw Qatar report a 0.4% fall month-on-month in its consumer price index inflation on a decline in expenses towards transport, recreation and food.

Al Rayan Islamic Index had fallen 1.92%, the 20-stock Total Return Index 1.87% and All Share Index (comprising wider constituents) 1.67% during the week, which saw industrials and consumer goods register faster declines in trade volumes.

Real estate saw its index plummet 4.4%, telecom (3.85%), insurance (2.76%), consumer goods (1.05%), banks and financial services (0.96%) and industrials (0.83%); while transport gained 0.74% during the week which saw HSBC economists aver that the Gulf economies, which have spent two generations depending on its petrodollars, have to necessarily look at speeding up their structural reforms, unless there is a fresh pick up in oil prices.

Market capitalisation eroded more than QR7bn or 1.39% to QR528.33bn with mid, small, micro and large cap equities melting 2.59%, 1.65%, 1.29% and 0.83% respectively during the week.

Small, mid, micro and large cap stocks have reported year-to-date losses at 15.46%, 10.12%, 8.17% and 3.8% respectively.

Of the 44 stocks, as many as 34 fell, while only six rose and four were unchanged. 11 of the 13 banks and financial services, seven of the eight industrials, six of the nine consumer goods, all the four realty, three of the five insurers, all the two telecom and one of the three transport stocks settled lower during the week.

About 81% of the stocks were in the red with major loser being Vodafone Qatar, Ooredoo, Qatar Insurance, Doha Bank, Ezdan, Qatari Investors Group, Commercial Bank, al khaliji, Qatar Islamic Bank, Aamal Company, Gulf International Services, Barwa, Mazaya Qatar and Mesaieed Petrochemicals Holding.

Nevertheless, Qatar First Bank, Industries Qatar, Nakilat, Gulf Warehousing and Doha Insurance were among the gainers during the week.

Foreign institutions turned net sellers to the tune of QR7.52mn compared with net buyers of QR684.55mn the week ended November 10.

However, domestic institutions’ net selling weakened considerably to QR22.55mn against QR679.34mn the previous week.

Local retail investors’ net profit booking declined to QR10.02mn compared to QR14.73mn the week ended November 10.

Non-Qatari individual investors’ net buying strengthened considerably to QR40.1mn against QR9.34mn the previous week.

Total trade volume fell 11% to 41.48mn shares and value by 30% to QR1.25bn but transactions grew marginally to 18,651 during the week.

The market witnessed 73% plunge in the industrials sector’s trade volume to 3.01mn equities, 65% in value to QR200.49mn and 40% in deals to 2,522.

The consumer goods sector’s trade volume plummeted 69% to 1.52mn stocks, value by 52% to QR132.96mn and transactions by 25% to 1,578.

However, the insurance sector’s trade volume more than tripled to 3.18mn shares and value also more than tripled to QR170.38mn on more than doubled deals to 1,026.

There was 31% surge in the telecom sector’s trade volume to 11.4mn equities and 43% in value to QR188.37mn on more than doubled transactions to 3,903.

The banks and financial services sector’s trade volume grew 10% to 13.53mn stocks, while value shrank 32% to QR380.39mn. Deals rose 7% to 5,773.

There was 1% jump in the real estate sector’s trade volume to 7.76mn shares but on 10% decline in value to QR148.98mn and 17% in transactions to 3,110.

The transport sector’s trade volume was up 1% to 1.07mn equities, whereas value was down 4% to QR31.48mn and deals by 10% to 739.

In the debt market, there was no trading of treasury bills and government bonds during the week.