Domestic and foreign institutions’ buying support on Wednesday steered the Qatar Stock Exchange back in positive terrain and its key index surpassed the 9,700 levels.
Led by telecom, banking and industrials segments, the 20-stock rose 0.42% to 9,705.54 points as trading turnover declined amidst higher volumes.
The Gulf institutions’ weakened net profit booking also helped instil bullish momentum in the market, which is, however, down 6.94% year-to-date.
Islamic stocks were seen gaining slower than the conventional ones in the bourse, where banking, industrials and realty stocks together constituted about 71% of the total trading volume.
Market capitalisation rose 0.37% or about QR2bn to QR522.3bn.
The Total Return Index gained 0.42% to 15,703.25 points, All Share Index by 0.35% to 2,714.8 points and Al Rayan Islamic Index by 0.34% to 3,812.32 points.
Telecom stocks appreciated 1.23%, banks and financial services (0.51%), industrials (0.45%), real estate (0.27%) and consumer goods (0.11%); whereas transport and insurance fell 0.4% and 0.37% respectively.
About 59% of the stocks extended gains with major movers being Ooredoo, Vodafone Qatar, Qatar Islamic Bank, Doha Bank, Gulf International Services, Mazaya Qatar, Barwa, Ahli Bank, Islamic Holding Group, Qatari German Company for Medical Devices, Widam Food, Qatari Investors Group, Qatar Electricity and Water and Mannai Corporation; even as al khaliji and Milaha bucked the trend.
Non-Qatari institutions turned net buyers to the tune of QR14.94mn against net sellers of QR5.52mn on May 24.
Domestic institutions’ net buying strengthened to QR4.39mn compared to QR0.59mn the previous day.
The GCC (Gulf Cooperation Council) institutions’ net selling fell to QR1.43mn against QR5.3mn on Tuesday.
Non-Qatari individual investors turned net buyers to the extent of QR0.14mn compared with net sellers QR3.16mn on May 24.
However, local retail investors turned net sellers to the tune of QR16.25mn against net buyers of QR14.17mn the previous day.
The GCC individual investors’ net profit booking strengthened to QR1.63mn compared to QR0.77mn on Tuesday.
Total trade volume rose 3% to 4.16mn shares, while value fell 6% to QR142.58mn and deals by 1% to 3,118.
The consumer goods sector’s trade volume almost tripled to 0.56mn equities and value more than doubled to QR15.85mn on 66% jump in transactions to 336.
The banks and financial services sector saw 27% surge in trade volume to 1.13mn stocks, 12% in value to QR42.13mn and 15% in deals to 891.
The insurance sector’s trade volume soared 14% to 0.08mn shares but value fell less than 1% to QR5.18mn; even as transactions gained 52% to 102.
There was 6% expansion in the telecom sector’s trade volume to 0.36mn equities but on 25% decline in value to QR11.9mn and 29% in deals to 520.
However, the industrials sector’s trade volume plunged 28% to 1mn stocks and value by 26% to QR44.46mn, while transactions were up 2% to 738.
The market witnessed 22% shrinkage in the transport sector’s trade volume to 0.21mn shares, 33% in value to QR6.02mn and 40% in deals to 122.
The real estate sector’s trade volume was down 7% to 0.81mn equities, value by 2% to QR17.03mn and 7% in transactions to 409.
In the debt market, there was no trading of treasury bills and government bonds.