Shares in cement companies led the Abu Dhabi benchmark to
end 0.5 percent higher. RAK Cement Company surged 6.4 percent and Union Cement
advanced 4.6 percent.
“Particularly among local investors, we’re seeing targeting
of some of the smaller laggards; everyone is looking for the serial
underperformers,” says Julian Bruce, EFG Hermes director of institutional
equity sales.
“But we can’t see big institutional investors committing
ahead of the weekend.”
Emirates Telecommunications Corp. (Etisalat) rose for the
fourth consecutive session boosted by progress to buy a 46-percent stake in
Kuwait’s Zain.
“The progress of the talks are going smoothly and (the deal)
is expected to be finalized very soon,” said a source familiar with the deal,
on Wednesday.
Shares in Zain fell 1.4 percent on Thursday, pulling the
index 0.9 percent lower but still above the resistance level of 7,000 points at
7,011 points.
Two Omani banks reported quarterly earnings on Thursday,
including the sultanate’s largest lender Bank Muscat, whose third quarter
profit surged 26 percent, beating analysts’ forecasts. Shares ended flat.
Third quarter profit at Bank Dhofar rose 5 percent and shares ended 0.5
percent higher but the index ended flat.
“Both banks went up before the results, so there is not much
effect on the index,” said Adel Nasr at United Securities in Muscat.
“Following these earnings, more investments will be seen in
Oman’s banking sector in in coming weeks,” said Nasr. “For now, investors will
wait for the remaining earnings to be announced.”
In Qatar too, heavyweight Industries Qatar reported better
than expected earnings, with third quarter profit up nearly 30 percent leading
shares 0.7 percent higher but the gain made little impact on the benchmark,
which ended almost flat.
Bahrain’s index, Egypt’s index and Dubai’s benchmark ended
lower.
Dubai bourse retreated 0.7 percent to 1,747 points while Abu
Dhabi’s benchmark gained 0.5
percent to 2,759 points.
Egypt’s stocks dipped 0.31 percent to 6,879 points.
