DUBAI: Bank of America Merrill Lynch raised its assessment of Qatar’s stock market to overweight from neutral, and cut the United Arab Emirates to neutral from overweight, according to a BofA Merrill Lynch Global Research report seen yesterday.
The investment bank cited Qatar’s surprise upgrade to emerging market status by Morgan Stanley Capital International, announced on Tuesday, which it said could attract $600m of index-linked funds to Qatar. It also cited attractive stock valuations.
MSCI-related fund flows to the UAE will be smaller while it is already fully valued after this year’s strong performance, it said. BofA-Merrill also reiterated that it saw Saudi Arabia as a preferred market, and kept an overweight rating on Turkey, though it said this was “conditional on an uneventful end to the protests” in Turkey.
Reuters
