The Qatar Stock Exchange on Thursday snapped six consecutive days of bearish spell to settle higher on strong buying support from Gulf and foreign institutions.
Heavy demand, especially at the insurance, telecom and consumer goods counters, led the 20-stock Qatar Index to gain 0.24% to 8,573.99 points.
The Doha Bank and Masraf Al Rayan sponsored exchange traded funds, QETF and QATR , saw 0.16% and 0.39% gains respectively.
The increased buying support from non-Qatari individuals also helped maintain the bullish momentum in the market, which is up 0.59% year-to-date.
Midcap equities witnessed robust buying interests in the bourse, whose capitalisation gained 0.09% to QR470.52bn.
Trade turnover and volumes were on the increase in the market, where the banking, industrials and real estate sectors together accounted for about 81% of the total volume.
The Total Return Index rose 0.24% to 15,105.76 points, the All Share Index by 0.21% to 2,525.17 points and the Al Rayan Islamic Index (Price) by 0.07% to 2,194.02 points.
The insurance index soared 1.85%, followed by telecom (1.08%), consumer goods (1.05%), transport (0.42%) and banks and financial services (0.07%); whereas realty and industrials declined 0.27% and 0.13% respectively.
More than 53% of the stocks extended gains with major movers being Qatar Insurance, Vodafone Qatar, Zad Holding, Qatari Investors Group, Doha Insurance, Gulf Warehousing, Barwa, Woqod, Qatar Islamic Bank, Dlala and Alijarah Holding.
Nevertheless, Mazaya Qatar, Milaha, Ezdan, Industries Qatar, QIIB, Qatar National Cement, Qatar Industrial Manufacturing and Qatar First Bank were among the losers.
The Gulf institutions’ net buying shot up influentially to QR26.3mn compared to QR18.88mn the previous day.
Non-Qatari funds turned net buyers to the tune of QR23.84mn against net sellers of QR23.67mn on March 28.
Non-Qatari individuals’ net buying grew perceptibly to QR8.74mn compared to QR2.17mn on Wednesday.
However, domestic funds’ net profit-booking strengthened substantially to QR61.8mn against QR24.3mn the previous day.
Gulf individuals turned net sellers to the extent of QR0.42mn compared with net buyers of QR0.81mn on March 28.
Local retail investors’ net buying weakened significantly to QR3.33mn against QR26.13mn on Wednesday.
Total trade volume rose 21% to 9.78mn shares, value by 51% to QR297.27mn and transactions by 28% to 4,665.
The telecom sector reported a 56% surge in trade volume to 0.67mn equities but on a 10% fall in value to QR10.9mn despite 33% higher deals to 362.
The real estate sector’s trade volume soared 28% to 1.61mn stocks, value by 19% to QR21.67mn and transactions by 53% to 857.
The banks and financial services sector saw a 24% expansion in trade volume to 4.3mn shares, 53% in value to QR119.65mn and 27% in deals to 1,696.
The insurance sector’s trade volume grew 18% to 0.67mn equities, value by less than 1% to QR19.04mn and transactions by 5% to 232.
The market witnessed a 17% increase in the industrials sector’s trade volume to 1.98mn stocks to more than double value to QR98.51mn on a 30% jump in deals to 862.
The transport sector’s trade volume was up 10% to 0.34mn shares, value by 46% to QR8.31mn and transactions by 34% to 259.
However, there was a 45% plunge in the consumer goods sector’s trade volume to 0.21mn equities, 17% in value to QR19.19mn and 1% in deals to 397.
In the debt market, there was no trading of treasury bills and sovereign bonds.
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