JEDDAH/AMMAN, 28 July 2007 — The Saudi stock market continued to rise last week buoyed by the midyear results of blue chip firms, particularly in the telecommunications and banking sectors.
The Tadawul All-Share Index (TASI) gained further 1.76 percent last week, closing at 7,633.54 points up from 7,501.56 points in the previous week.
However, TASI is currently 3.78 percent lower than the year’s start.
The weekly report of the Riyadh-based Bakheet Financial Advisors (BFA) noticed a spate of speculation particularly in the insurance sector, which accounted for 28 percent of the market’s turnover whereas it represented only 1.4 percent of the bourse’s capitalization.
The insurance sector dominated trading last week as shares in Saudi Fransi Cooperative Insurance Company (Allianz SF), which made its debut on the Tadawul on Monday, continued to surge and rose 1,225 percent in three days of trading last week. Its shares closed on Wednesday at SR132.50.
Shares in another insurance company, Sanad Insurance & Reinsurance Cooperative Company, which started trading last Saturday, jumped 477.50 percent to SR57.75 last week.
Arabian Shield Cooperative Insurance Co. shares surged 22.51 percent to SR58.50.
SABB Takaful shares, which started trading on June 16, gained 14.63 percent to SR168.50 last week.
Sanad was most active by value and volume last week. Over SR3.18 billion worth of Sanad shares changed hands at the volume of 64,061,975 shares.
The BFA expected Saudi stocks to score “gradual” gains in the coming weeks against the backdrop of a 20 percent increase in blue chip profits in the second quarter of the year over those of the first quarter.
Meanwhile, the Saudi Capital Market Authority (CMA), the stock market regulator, has announced that the Kingdom Holding Company’s (KHC’s) shares will start trading at 10.15 a.m. from tomorrow on the Tadawul.
The trading will continue until 3.30 p.m. on that day, according to a report posted on the Tadawul website on Wednesday. KHC’s shares will be traded in the services sector.
Shares in Saudi Telecom Co. (STC) and Etihad Etisalat jumped 7.11 percent to SR67.75 and 7.76 percent to SR62.50, respectively.
The Saudi stock market turnover dropped to SR36.84 billion from SR42.76 billion in the previous week.
Arab stock markets showed mixed performance last week and financial analysts said yesterday they expect regional bourses not to behave in tandem in the coming weeks due to the difference in fundamentals and moving factors.
The Kuwaiti stock exchange extended gains last week while the Jordanian and United Arab Emirates shares retreated.
“We believe this discrepancy in performance among Arab bourses is natural due to the different fundamentals and other factors ruling at each market, including the semi-annual results,” an Amman-based portfolio manager told Arab News.
“However, we think speculation and caution will remain a common state of affairs at all regional bourses in the coming weeks, given the extensive losses to which investors were exposed over the past year,” he said.
Jordanian shares remained steady during last week despite the forced closure of client positions on Thursday.
The all-share price index of the Amman Stock Exchange shed 0.63 percent last week, closing at 5,682 points compared with previous week’s closure at 5,718 points.
Kuwait’s KSE all-share price index gained 0.6 percent last week, closing at 12,491 points up from 12,411 points in the previous week.
The focus of trading last week was in the real estate sector, which accounted for about 37 percent of the market’s volume, the Global Investment House (Global) said in its weekly report.
The unified all-share price index of the UAE stock exchanges of Dubai and Abu Dhabi retreated 0.7 percent to close last week at 4,487 points from 4,519 points in the previous week.
Analysts attributed the decline to a “profit-taking” move particularly it came after several weeks of gains.
They expected the UAE bourses to witness fresh rebounds in the coming weeks with special focus on the real estate sector.
The GulfBase GCC index edged higher slightly last week to 5,429.78 points. The value of GCC traded shares, however, declined by 15.77 percent to $14 billion and volume fell 30.03 percent to 3.82 billion shares last week.