DUBAI: Dubai’s main stock index jumped 3 percent to its highest close since October 2008 as major Middle Eastern bourses started 2014 on a strong note, buoyed by expectations for solid economic growth this year.

Flagship Dubai companies led their market up, with Emaar Properties surging 3.1 percent, lender Emirates NBD climbing 4.7 percent and Dubai Financial Market, the region’s only listed stock exchange, rising 1.6 percent.

Property firms are expected to be among the main beneficiaries as Dubai begins investing this year to host the 2020 World Expo, while the UAE’s upgrade to emerging market status by major index compilers should attract more foreign money to its markets.

Dubai Islamic Bank shot up 11.9 percent, its largest one-day gain in at least two years. Last month it said it would increase its foreign ownership limit to help facilitate buying by large institutional investors from overseas.

Dubai Investments, a state-owned conglomerate, gained 2.8 percent after it predicted 2013 profit would come in about 150 percent higher than in 2012.

Other Gulf markets rose by more moderate amounts but they also continued last year’s uptrends. Abu Dhabi and Qatar both rose 1.6 percent.

Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank, in jumping 6.2 percent on Thursday, hit a share price not seen since June 2006.

A Reuters survey of leading Middle East fund managers, published on the last day of 2013, found a third of them expecting to hike Middle East equity allocations in the next three months while none expected to reduce them.

Kuwait, weighed down by continued tensions between its cabinet and parliament which are hindering economic policy, rose only 0.1 percent. Its index is much less bullish technically than many Gulf markets, having dropped last month below its 200-day average.

Oman’s stock market gained 0.3 percent. Financial Affairs Minister Darwish Al-Balushi announced a 2014 budget which envisages spending growth of just 5 percent from the 2013 plan, a slowdown after three years of big rises.

But he did not give fresh details of the government’s plans to revive its privatization program, saying that could affect the stock market. Investors are still awaiting a previously-announced offer of 19 percent of Oman Telecommunications Co. that is expected to raise around $600 million.

Egypt’s market gained 0.4 percent, with investors still focusing more on signs that aid from the Gulf will revive the economy than on the country’s continued political uncertainty.

Arabia Investments, an investment firm which operates in fields such as power and building materials and could benefit from economic projects financed by the Gulf aid, jumped its 10 percent daily limit.

EFG Hermes, one of the largest investment banks in the Middle East, rose 1.4 percent after it appointed Khalid Ellaicy, former chief financial officer of Orascom Telecom, as its new CFO.

EFG also said it had recently acquired a 65 percent stake in Credit Libanais as it seeks to expand into retail and commercial banking.