Steep gains in the last two days helped the Qatar Stock Exchange (QSE) reach near 10,400 levels this week, which saw the initial public offering of Baladna, the proposed holding company of dairy farm major, reportedly oversubscribing.
Stronger demand, especially in the insurance, consumer goods, banking and real estate sectors, led the barometer to add more than 89 points this week, which witnessed the QSE showcase as many as 13 listed firms, representing blue-chips, before global fund managers in London.
The weakened profit booking pressure from domestic funds and non-Qatari individuals was instrumental in lifting the 20-stock benchmark 0.86% this week, which saw the QSE unveil its Q-Disclosure platform in a move towards single global electronic financial reporting standard, allowing more efficient retrieval and analysis of financial information.
However, there was increased net selling by local retail investors and there were weakened buying interests from non-Qatari funds this week, which saw global index compiler MSCI decided to include QIIB in its Qatar index.
About 67% of the traded constituents extended gains this week, which witnessed Islamic stocks gain slower than the other indices.
Trade turnover grew amidst lower volumes this week, which saw as many as 1.47mn Masraf Al Rayan sponsored exchange traded funds QATR valued at QR3.4mn trade across 23 transactions.
The Total Return Index gained 0.86%, Al Rayyan Islamic Index by 0.75% and All Share Index by 0.78% this week, which saw a total of 689 Doha Bank sponsored QETF valued at QR7,000 changed hands across four deals.
The insurance index soared 3.13%, consumer goods (1.71%), banks and financial services (0.9%), real estate (0.88%), telecom (0.46%) and industrials (0.05%); while transport declined 1.11% this week which saw Qatar's cost of living, based on consumer price index inflation, decline 0.84% year-on-year in October 2019.
Major gainers included Qatar Insurance, Qatar General Insurance and Reinsurance, Vodafone Qatar, Gulf Warehousing, Mazaya Qatar, Ezdan, Qatar Electricity and Water, Gulf International Services, Mesaieed Petrochemical, QIIB and Qatar First Bank; while Qatar National Cement, Milaha, Ooredoo, Qatar Industrial Manufacturing and Medicare Group were among the losers this week which saw QIIB’s sukuk oversubscribe nine-fold.
Market capitalisation rose 0.67% or about QR4bn to QR572.36bn, mainly on mid and small cap equities this week which saw banking and industrials constitute about 68% of the trading volume.
The banks and financial services sector accounted for 38% of the trading volume, industrials (30%), real estate (17%), consumer goods (7%), telecom (4%), transport (3%) and insurance (2%) this week.
In terms of value, banks and financial services accounted for 66%, industrials (14%), consumer goods (7%), realty (5%), telecom (4%), transport (3%) and insurance (2%) this week.
Domestic funds’ net selling declined significantly to QR23.64mn compared to QR158.28mn the week ended November 7.
Non-Qatari individuals’ net profit booking shrank noticeably to QR3.3mn against QR29.51mn the previous week.
However, non-Qatari funds’ net buying weakened considerably to QR67.3mn compared to QR200.79mn a week ago.
Local retail investors’ net selling grew perceptibly to QR40.36mn against QR13.09mn the week ended November 7.
Total trade volume fell 23% to 333.12mn shares, while value grew 21% to QR1.06bn and transactions by 29% to 29,160.
The insurance sector’s trade volume plummeted 70% to 5.95mn equities, value by 66% to QR16.43mn and deals by 38% to 761.
The consumer goods sector reported 61% plunge in trade volume to 21.75mn stocks, 44% in value to QR72.06mn and 13% in transactions to 2,646.
The real estate sector’s trade volume tanked 35% to 55.36mn shares and value by 32% to QR52.9mn, whereas deals were up 6% to 2,254.
The banks and financial services sector saw 24% shrinkage in trade volume to 128.01mn equities but on 69% jump in value to QR697.04mn and 68% in transactions to 13,128.
The telecom sector’s trade volume declined 16% to 13.88mn stocks, while value was up 4% to QR44.05mn and deals by 6% to 2,450.
However, there was 48% surge in the transport sector’s trade volume to 11.08mn shares and 30% in value to QR36.8mn on more than doubled transactions to 1,610.
The industrials sector’s trade volume expanded 19% to 97.1mn equities, value by 4% to QR145.58mn and deals by 19% to 6,311.

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