Stronger buying interests of foreign institutions and substantially lower selling pressure from their domestic counterparts imparted bullish momentum to the Qatar Stock Exchange.

Higher than average buying support within insurance, consumer goods, realty, industrials and banking equities helped the 20-stock Qatar Index gain 21 points or 0.19% to settle at 10,933.69 points.

Both non-Qatar and Gulf individual investors however turned bearish in the market, whose year-to-date gains were seen at 4.76%.

Islamic stocks were seen outperforming the main index as well as the other indices in the bourse, where net selling by local retail investors and Gulf institutions was seen strengthening.

Trade turnover and volumes expanded in the market, where real estate, banking, telecom and transport sectors together accounted for more than three-fourth of the total volumes.

Market capitalisation expanded more than QR2bn or 0.39% to QR588.17bn as small and microcaps gained 1.74% and 0.1%, while large and midcaps fell 0.68% and 0.44% respectively.

The Total Return Index rose 0.3% to 17,767.77 points, All Share Index by 0.42% to 3,011.62 points and Al Rayan Islamic Index by 0.67% to 4,145.86 points.

The insurance sector saw its index expand 3.32%, consumer goods (0.98%), realty (0.71%), industrials (0.69%) and banks and financial services (0.43%); whereas transport and telecom declined 3.34% and 1.05% respectively.

Major gainers included QNB, Industries Qatar, Qatar Insurance, Barwa, Al Meera, Mannai Corporation, Qatari Investors Group, Mesaieed Petrochemical Holding, Ezdan, Vodafone Qatar and Islamic Holding Group.

Nevertheless, Ooredoo, Nakilat, Milaha, al khaliji, Qatar First Bank, Doha Bank, Gulf International Services, Qatar Electricity and Water and Mazaya Qatar saw their stocks lose sheen.

Non-Qatari institutions’ net buying increased perceptibly to QR44.73mn compared to QR39.4mn the previous day.

Domestic institutions’ net profit booking weakened considerably to QR3.37mn against QR66.07mn on February 20.

However, local retail investors’ net selling strengthened substantially to QR22.8mn compared to QR0.08mn on Monday.

Non-Qatari individual investors turned net sellers to the tune of QR4.12mn against net buyers of QR32.86mn the previous day.

The GCC (Gulf Cooperation Council) retail investors were also net sellers to the extent of QR6.54mn compared with net buyers of QR1.45mn on February 20.

The GCC institutions’ net profit booking increased marginally to QR7.85mn against QR7.52mn on Monday.

Total trade volume rose 16% to 10.58mn shares, value by 1% to QR396.54mn and deals by 14% to 5,178.

The transport sector’s trade volume grew almost six-fold to 1.62 equities and value almost tripled to QR45.42mn on more than doubled transactions to 594.

There was 28% surge in the real estate’s trade volume to 3.1mn stocks, 38% in value to QR70.3mn and 29% in deals to 916.

The telecom sector’s trade volume soared 20% to 1.63mn shares, value by 98% to QR34.06mn and transactions by 69% to 422.

The market witnessed 5% expansion in the consumer goods sector’s trade volume to 0.97mm equities, 71% in value to QR89.94mn and 35% in deals to 966.

However, the insurance sector’s trade volume plummeted 34% to 0.75mn stocks and value by less than 1% to QR51.64mn, whereas transactions more than tripled to 529.

The banks and financial services sector saw 17% plunge in trade volume to 1.63mn shares, 53% in value to QR66.09mn and 31% in deals to 966.

The industrials sector’s trade volume plummeted 14% to 0.88mn equities, value by 39% to QR39.09mn and transactions by 27% to 785.

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

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