Qatar gains as Gulf stocks find support from robust oil price

The Qatar index rose 0.3% to 9,134 points yesterday, as most stock markets in the Gulf rose modestly, lifted by a rally in oil prices at the end of last week.Three small to mid-sized Saudi Arabian insurers fell sharply after they were slapped with a temporary ban by the central bank.Riyadh’s index added 0.4% to 7,209 points as all but two of the 14 listed petrochemical producers advanced after Brent oil surged 3.3% on Friday.Rabigh Refining and Petrochemical rose 1.6%. Saudi Indian Company for Cooperative Insurance dropped 3.8%, Malath Cooperative Insurance fell 4.5% and Arabian Shield Cooperative Insurance slumped 7.6%. The central bank said it was temporarily banning those insurers from selling vehicle policies because of “serious breaches” in their car insurance practices.Another insurer, Sabb Takaful, closed up 0.2%. Saudi British Bank (SABB) announced that it had signed an agreement to buy all of HSBC’s shares in the insurance company for 117.8mn riyals ($31.4mn), taking SABB’s total ownership in the insurer to 65%. The deal, which is pending board and regulatory approvals, is expected to be completed in the second half of this year.Shares of SABB fell 0.7%.In the United Arab Emirates, Dubai’s index rose 0.4% to 3,615 points on the back of gains in stocks that were volatile last week.Union Properties, the most heavily traded share yesterday, jumped 4.3% to 0.898 dirham.Last week the Motor City developer reported a big quarterly loss as it fixed accounting errors; the stock has now regained the level where it was trading before the announcement of the loss.“Funds with excess cash have been chasing alpha and not fundamentals,” said a Dubai-based fund manager. “In such an environment it would be hard to call any trend or direction.”Abu Dhabi’s index closed flat at 4,493 points in thin trade; Dana Gas rose 3.3%, while Abu Dhabi National Energy lost 1.6% on profit-taking from last week’s jump.Banking shares were robust in Doha, helping lift the index 0.3% higher. Commercial Bank gained 1.2%.Egypt’s index fell 0.7% to 13,026 points as shares of El Sewedy Electric lost 1.3% on profit-taking.In the previous two sessions they had jumped 9.3% after the company reported a 72% jump in its second-quarter net income and proposed a cash dividend of 8 Egyptian pounds per share.Elsewhere in the Gulf, the Kuwait index added 0.2% to 6,901 points; the Bahrain index gained 1.0% to 1,312 points and the Oman index rose 0.5% to 4,913 points.