The Qatar Stock Exchange Thursday continued its bullish run for the seventh consecutive day, mainly on strong buying interests of foreign institutions.
Buying interests in the banking counter largely overcame the selling pressure in five other sectors, thus helping the 20-stock Qatar Index settle 0.32% higher at 9,259.95 points.
Doha Bank sponsored exchange traded fund QETF saw 0.05% gains; where as Masraf Al Rayan sponsored QATR tanked 2.9%.
Islamic stocks were seen outperforming the other indices in the market, which is up 8.64% year-to-date.
However, domestic institutions turned bearish and there was increased net selling by local retail investors on the bourse, whose capitalisation was up 0.17% to QR504.19bn, mainly lifted by large and microcaps.
Trade turnover and volumes were on the increase on the market, where banking, transport and telecom sectors together accounted for about 71% of the total volume.
The Total Return Index grew 0.32% to 16,315.01 points, All Share Index by 0.1% to 2,676.94 points and Al Rayan Islamic Index (Price) by 0.46% to 2,283.9 points.
The banks and financial services index soared 0.53% and industrials (0.12%); whereas insurance declined 0.81%, telecom (0.65%), realty (0.41%), transport (0.26%) and consumer goods (0.17%).
Major movers included Medicare Group, Qatar Electricity and Water, Mazaya Qatar, QNB, Qatar Islamic Bank and Commercial Bank; even as Qatar Insurance, Ezdan, Ooredoo, Vodafone Qatar, Nakilat, Aamal Company, Gulf International Services and Alijarah Holding were among the losers.
Non-Qatari institutions’ net buying increased significantly to QR33.33mn compared to QR4.62mn on July 4.
The Gulf institutions turned net buyers to the tune of QR2.86mn against net sellers of QR3.99mn the previous day.
The Gulf individuals were also net buyers to the extent of QR1.28mn compared with net sellers of QR3.04mn on Wednesday.
Non-Qatari individual investors’ net profit booking declined influentially to QR0.15mn against QR1.5mn on July 4.
However, local individuals’ net selling strengthened considerably to QR18.92mn compared to QR9.99mn the previous day.
Domestic institutions turned net profit takers to the tune of QR18.4mn against net buyers of QR13.89mn on Wednesday.
Total trade volume rose 3% to 9.11mn shares, value by 18% to QR193.44mn and transactions by 3% to 2,836.
The transport sector’s trade volume grew about nine-fold to 2.2mn equities and value by more than six-fold to QR32.67mn on almost tripled deals to 307.
The insurance sector’s trade volume more than doubled to 0.19mn stocks and value also more than doubled to QR6.48mn on 35% jump in transactions to 144.
The real estate sector reported 62% surge in trade volume to 1.41mn shares, 9% in value to QR16.24mn and 26% in deals to 494.
The banks and financial services sector’s trade volume soared 24% to 2.66mn equities, value by 92% to QR85.39mn and transactions by 11% to 798.
The industrials sector saw 13% increase in trade volume to 0.86mn stocks but on 20% shrinkage in value to QR183.84mn and 1% in deals to 551.
However, the telecom sector’s trade volume plummeted 59% to 1.78mn shares, value by 54% to QR21.04mn and transactions by 47% to 309.
There was 59% plunge in the consumer goods sector’s trade volume to 0.19mn equities, 52% in value to QR12.78mn and 23% in deals to 233.
In the debt market, there was no trading of treasury bills and sovereign bonds.
