JEDDAH: The Saudi stock market retreated as world stocks fell on Wednesday due to renewed fears about the US financial sector and doubts about economic recovery. Other Gulf markets also suffered heavy losses.
The Tadawul All-Share Index (TASI) declined 0.29 percent to close at 5,617.31.
Market weakness can be seen with only two sectors closing with gains, namely Energy & Utilities and Industrial Investment, which were up 0.45 percent and 0.85 percent respectively. On the negative side, however, all other 13 sectors closed with losses, which ranged from -0.01 percent in the Cement sector to -3.30 percent in the Insurance sector. Overall market breadth remains negative with 19 advancers and 99 decliners generating an AD ratio of 0.19, the Jeddah-based Financial Transaction House (FTH) said in its daily market commentary.
The stock market turnover was SR2.4 billion in thin trading.
The new Mouwasat Medical Services Company made its debut on Tadawul on Wednesday. The SR44 Mouwasat shares opened at SR55 and reached a high of SR57.59 and a low of SR51.50 before settling at SR52.25 at the close of trading, a gain of 18.75 percent.
Mouwasat offered 7.5 million shares (30 percent of its issued shares) in initial public offering from Aug. 15 to Aug. 21.
According to the monthly report of Tadawul for August, TASI closed at a level of 5,660.89 points and lost 117.25 points (2.03 percent) over the close of the previous month. On an YTD basis, TASI registered a positive return of 17.86 percent.
The report said the highest close level for the index during the month was 5,887.19 as on Aug. 10. Total equity market capitalization at the end of August reached SR1.09 trillion and decreased by 1.35 percent over the month of July.
The total value of shares traded fell by 20.68 percent to reach at SR79.63 billion in August. The total number of shares traded reached 2.87 billion compared to 3.72 billion shares traded in July, decreasing by 22.83 percent.
The total number of transactions executed during August dropped by 12.90 percent to reach 2.73 million compared to 3.13 million trades for July.
Meanwhile, SABB Takaful Co. increased its paid up capital by offering 24 million new shares “rights issue” at a price of SR12.5 per share, raising its total number of issued shares to 34 million.
SABB Takaful announced this week that it had successfully raised SR343.4 million in capital through its rights issue. In terms of value, this represents a total coverage of 114.5 percent from the SR300 million the company sought to raise.
According to statistics provided by Aldukheil Financial Group, the financial adviser and lead manager of the rights issue, SABB Takaful’s eligible shareholders subscribed to 25,530,835 shares, representing 106.4 percent of the rights issue shares.
