Doha: Qatar Exchange index dropped fractionally by 0.07 of a point to 12,443.42 points yesterday compared to 12,443.49 on Thursday.
The market capitalisation decreased to QR660.67bn from QR661.97bn registered on Thursday.
The traded value decreased to QR439.48m with a volume of 13,561,309 shares from 5,536 transactions compared with QR566.82m with a volume of 13,892,679 shares from 6,142 transactions on Thursday.
Barring real estate index which gained 1.45 percent, all other indices declined.
Al Rayan Islamic Index dropped 0.37 percent and All Share Index dropped 0.13 percent.
Meanwhile, most regional markets slipped yesterday after oil prices fell, while Egyptian equities extended gains following the delay of an unpopular capital gains tax.
Brent oil fell $1.17, or 1.8 percent, to $65.37 a barrel on Friday, declining 2.1 percent on the week as a rallying dollar and profit-taking ahead of a long US holiday weekend cut short a two-day rally.
Petrochemicals giant Saudi Basic Industries, whose profits are sensitive to oil prices, dropped 2.5 percent and was the main drag on Saudi Arabia’s index which lost 0.4 percent.
Other blue chips were also mostly weak as investor sentiment appeared to suffer following an Islamic State suicide bomb attack. The blast killed 21 worshippers on Friday in a packed Shia mosque in eastern Saudi Arabia in one of the deadliest assaults in recent years in the largest Gulf Arab country.
But Bahri, the exclusive oil-shipper for Saudi Aramco, rose 1.9 percent to a new all-time closing high of SR54.50 after saying yesterday it had signed a deal to buy five very large crude tankers from ship builders Hyundai Heavy Industries.
Hyundai will build the tankers and deliver them to Bahri in 2017. Bahri also has an option to buy five more. It did not say how much it would pay for the tankers, although each will have a capacity of 300,000 deadweight tonnage.
Dubai’s index fell 1.7 percent as most stocks declined. Builder Arabtec dropped 3.3 percent after Egyptian newspaper Al Mal reported, citing an anonymous source, that a planned deal between the firm and the Cairo government to build 1 million housing units in Egypt has fallen through.
Neither the Egyptian government nor Arabtec were available for immediate comment on the project whose value was estimated at 280bn Egyptian pounds ($36.70bn).
Retail and entertainment startup Marka was one of just a handful of gainers, rising 1.6 percent after it said in a statement it expected the earnings of restaurant chain Reem Al Bawadi, which it bought this month, to grow at a rate of more than 25 percent annually in coming years. Marka also said it planned three more acquisitions in 2015. Abu Dhabi’s bourse dropped 0.7 percent as large lenders National Bank of Abu Dhabi and First Gulf Bank fell 0.9 and 1.0 percent respectively.
Egypt’s index rose 1.5 percent to a fresh seven-week closing high of 9,122 points, extending the broad rally which started last week when the Cairo government put on hold its plan to introduce a 10 percent capital gains tax.
For a second session in a row, the Cairo benchmark closed above technical resistance at 8,860 points, its early May peak, triggering a minor double bottom formed by the April and May lows and pointing up to around 9,400 points.
Agencies
