Strong buying on the last day was of no avail to the Qatar Stock Exchange, which settled 170 points lower last week that saw Doha outline its ‘positive” economic outlook before the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.

Insurance, industrials and realty sectors saw higher-than-average selling pressure, leading the main barometer to plunge 2.04% last week, which saw Qatar Islamic Bank and Masraf Al Rayan report QR1.77bn and QR1.56bn net profit during January-September this year.
Foreign institutions and individual investors continued to be net buyers but with lesser intensity this week which saw Ahli Bank and Commercial Bank register QR518.15mn and QR258.98mn net profit in the first nine months of this year.
Domestic institutions’ net profit booking weakened, while local retail investors were increasingly into net selling this week which saw Qatar National Cement post a net profit of QR242.8mn at the end of nine-month ended September 30, 2017.
Islamic stocks were seen declining faster than the main index this week which saw a total of 4,450 sovereign bonds valued at QR44.5mn trade across one deal and as many as 2,915 treasury bills worth QR29.02mn change hands across two transactions.
The market was highly skewed towards decliners this week which witnessed banking, real estate and industrials counters together account for about 83% of total trading volume.
The banks and financial services sector accounted for 47% of the total volume, realty (19%), industrials (17%), telecom (7%), consumer goods (5%), transport (4%) and insurance (2%) this week which saw Qatari Investors Group and Gulf Warehousing witness QR193.25mn and QR157.26mn net profit during January-September this year.
The banks and financial services’ share in total trade turnover was 48%, industrials (19%), real estate (11%), consumer goods and telecom (7% each), transport (4%) and insurance (3%) this week which saw Qatar's consumer price index inflation edge up 0.1% month-on-month this September.
Major gainers included QNB, Ooredoo and Qatar General and Reinsurance; whereas Commercial Bank, Doha Bank, Qatar Insurance, Industries Qatar, Vodafone Qatar, Aamal Company, Mazaya Qatar, Barwa, Ezdan and Nakilat this week which saw Vodafone Qatar’s initiatives to change the financial year to January-December to make it compatible with other listed companies.
Non-Qatari funds’ net buying weakened substantially to QR66.03mn compared to QR75.68mn the week ended October 12.
Non-Qatari individual investors’ net buying also declined perceptibly to QR3.73mn against QR12.94mn a week ago.
Local retail investors’ net profit booking increased to QR25.52mn compared to QR22.49mn the week ended October 12.
Domestic institutions’ net selling fell impressively to QR44.32mn against QR66.13mn the previous week.
Total trade volume fell 18% to 31.83mn shares, value by 12% to QR746.1mn and deals by 11% to 11,276.
The market saw 45% plunge in the telecom sector’s trade volume to 2.21mn equities but on 13% increase in value to QR54.16mn and 14% in transactions to 1,065.
The insurance sector’s trade volume plummeted 43% to 0.49mn stocks, value by 48% to QR21.67mn and 1% in deals to 445.
The industrials sector’s trade volume tanked 40% to 5.47mn shares, value by 17% to QR140.24mn and transactions by 7% to 2,424.
The real estate sector reported 34% shrinkage in trade volume to 5.95mn equities, 29% in value to QR83.18mn and 37% in deals to 1,601.
The transport sector’s trade volume declined 16% to 1.37mn stocks, value by 21% to QR29.67mn and transactions by 24% to 939.
There was 11% slippage in the consumer goods sector’s trade volume to 1.45mn shares but on 12% jump in value to QR55.54mn and 17% in deals to 897.
However, the banks and financial services sector’s trade volume expanded 18% to 14.89mn equities, whereas value was down 5% to QR361.65mn and transactions by 7% to 3,905.

 

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