RIYADH, 4 July 2003 — Saudi shares rose slightly in the week ending yesterday despite profit-taking sales accompanied by a seasonal lull in trading, traders said. The Tadawul All-Shares Index (TASI) finished the week at 3,600.19 points, up 0.2 percent on last week’s closing of 3,594.63 points.

The TASI is 43 percent higher than at the start of 2003, but down 1.2 percent on its all-time high of 3,644.29 points recorded on June 16 following the Cabinet’s approval of the Capital Market Law to set up a formal stock exchange. Analysts expected the market to ease off in the coming two months.

They also predicted the market would pick up again in September. Prices of 40 firms increased, 21 companies dropped, while four issues were unchanged. Four companies did not trade. Trading value dropped by six percent to SR11.7 billion ($3.1 billion) from SR12.5 billion ($3.3 billion) last week.

Meanwhile, the Kuwait Stock Exchange (KSE) shed 2.96 percent in the week to Wednesday as the market continued to witness what economists described as a long-term correction. The index finished on 3,582.9 points, down 109.4 points on the week but still up 50.8 percent on the year.

Trading value this week averaged $201 million, down on last week’s $315 million.

Last month the KSE set a new average trading value of more than $360 million in a market that for six months has seen consistently high cash flows.

Market capitalization is now 13.882 billion dinars ($46.2 billion).

Defying fears of the fallout from the US-led war in Iraq, the market in April broke through the all-time high of 2,823.4 points reached on Nov. 1, 1997, and kept climbing.

The index almost rose above the 4,000-point psychological mark on June 21, reaching 3,988.6 points, before heading south.

The index last year fell below 2,000 points on war fears but increased cash flows and high oil prices helped regain losses to end 2002 up 39 percent on the previous year.

The other Gulf markets registered gains.

In Qatar, the CBQ index ended on 583.56 points yesterday, up from 568.23 points last week, or an increase of 2.7 percent.

In Oman, the MSM index finished at 240.517 points, up from 237.75 points last week, while in the United Arab Emirates, the NBAD closed on 3,670.63 points, up from 3,619.35 points last week.

In Bahrain, the BSE index finished at 1964.37 points, up from 1,955.44 last Thursday. The bourse in Tehran registered a spectacular leap of 6.8 percent. The Tepix index closed on 7,287.05 points, compared to 6,819.02 points last week. The index had already increased by 3.3 last week.

Elsewhere in the Middle East, the bourse in Jordan registered a gain of 5.1 percent, with the ASE index closing on 210.56 points, compared to 200.27 last Thursday.

In Egypt, the HFI index registered a slight improvement of 0.4 percent, closing yesterday at 8,554.79 points, compared to 8,518.24 last week. The index had climbed 3.6 percent a week earlier.

In Lebanon, the BLOM index closed on 472.85 points, a slight decline from last Thursday’s 473.38 points.