Amidst hopes of oil production cuts by four major players and backed by Iran, Qatar Stock Exchange (QSE) closed the week near the 10,000 mark and capitalisation increase more than QR23bn on the back of strong buying support from foreign institutions.

 Mid and large cap equities witnessed brisk buying during the week, which global credit rating agency Standard and Poor’s affirm its ‘AA’ long-term and ‘A-1+’ short-term foreign and local currency sovereign credit ratings on Qatar with “stable” outlook.

 Consumer goods, insurance, real estate and industrials stocks witnessed higher than average buying support during the week, which saw Gulf Drilling International, a subsidiary of Gulf International Services (GIS), take delivery of the new liftboat constructed by Nakilat-Keppel Offshore and Marine.

 The week started with robust gain and sustained its bull run for the next two day but to see profit booking on the Wednesday. On the last day, taking cue from reports that Iran also decided to back the production cut already hinted by Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Venezuela and Russia, there was a huge buying support that took the index to a high of 9,967 points on Thursday.

 About 70% of the stocks extended gains to investors as the 20-stock Qatar Index gained a robust 5.7% during the week which saw Dubai gain 3.74%, Abu Dhabi (3.46%), Muscat (1.15%), Bahrain (0.52%) and Kuwait (0.18%).

 QSE is however down 4.43% year-to-date against a precipitous fall of 8.44% in Kuwait, 3.57% in Bahrain, 2.19% in Abu Dhabi and 1.84% in Dubai; even as Muscat was up 0.24%.

 Amidst overarching bullish sentiments, local retail investors’ buying substantially weakened and domestic institutions were increasingly net profit takers during week which also saw trading turnover and volumes on the rise.

 The index that tracks Shariah-principled stocks was seen gaining slower than the other indices during the week which witnessed the industrials, realty, consumer goods and banking sectors together account for about 87% of the total trading volume.

 The 20-stock Total Return Index soared 5.07%, All Share Index (comprising wider constituents) by 4.94% and Al Rayan Islamic Index by 3.46% during the week which saw GIS, Barwa and Masraf Al Rayan dominate the trading ring in terms of volume and value.

 Consumer goods stocks shot up 10.84%, insurance (6.29%), realty (5.8%), industrials (5.4%), banks and financial services (4.79%) and transport (0.8%); whereas telecom fell 0.58% during the week.

 Market capitalisation expanded 4.56% to QR529.03bn with mid, large, small and micro cap equities gaining 6.52%, 5.17%, 1.94% and 1.47% respectively during the week.

 Micro, small, large and mid cap stocks have however fallen year-to-date 12.19%, 7.83%, 4.26% and 0.9% respectively.

 Of the 43 stocks, as many as 30 advanced, while only 12 declined and one was unchanged during the week.

 Nine of the 12 banks and financial services; five each of the eight consumer goods and the nine industrials; four each of the five insurers and the four real estate; two of the three transport; and one of the two telecom stocks closed higher during the week.

 Major gainers were Salam International Investment, Woqod, Mannai Corporation, Barwa and United Development Company; even as Al Khaleej Takaful, Gulf Warehousing, Aamal Company and Islamic Holding Group bucked the trend during the week.

 Foreign institutions turned net buyers to the tune of QR98.31mn against net sellers of QR138.17mn the week ended February 11.

 However, domestic institutions’ net profit booking strengthened considerably to QR103.57mn compared to QR20.62mn the previous week.

 Local retail investors’ net buying weakened perceptibly to QR2.79mn against QR149.89mn the week ended February 11.

 Non-Qatari retail investors’ net buying declined to QR2.48mn compared to QR8.9mn the previous week.

 Total trade volume rose 53% to 50.57mn shares, value by 37% to QR1.55bn and transactions by 37% to 24,076 during the week.

 The consumer goods sector’s trade volume more than tripled to 10.07mn equities and value more than doubled to QR252.91mn on 89% jump in deals to 4,111.

 The transport sector’s trade volume more than doubled to 3.2mn stocks and value also more than doubled to QR95.43mn on more than doubled transactions to 1,374.

 The insurance sector’s trade volume soared 74% to 1.2mn shares, more than doubling value to QR67.17mn on 84% expansion in deals to 638.

 The real estate sector saw 57% surge in trade volume to 10.96mn equities, 47% in value to QR240.9mn and 51% in transactions to 4,002.

 The telecom sector’s trade volume shot up 36% to 2.28mn stocks, even as value shrank 24% to QR51.48mn and deals by 3% to 1,940.

 The banks and financial services sector reported 19% jump in trade volume to 10mn shares, 21% in value to QR385.91mn and 25% in transactions to 5,136.

 The industrials sector’s trade volume increased 15% to 12.86mn equities, value by 9% to QR454.35mn and deals by 23% to 6,875.

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