21 June 2015
Saudi Arabia's benchmark Tadawul All-Share Index retreated to 9,505.74 points last week, which was roughly where it started the week.

The Index reduced merely 0.13 percent for the entire week, wavering in a wide range of 205 points.

On year-to-date basis, the index showed an attractive return of 14 percent, the highest return among GCC stock markets.

Total market capitalization of Saudi stock exchange decreased slightly to SR2.09 trillion.

Among sectoral indices, Energy & Utilities made the biggest weekly jump of one percent, closing at 6,531.72.

On the other negative side, Insurance sector posted the largest losses, dipping 2.81 percent in a week.

Transport sector was another significant decliner, going down 2.08 percent to 10,164.86.

Most of the major heavyweights closed the week in red, where Samba Financial Group and Kingdom holding each plunged more than two percent.

However, Al-Rajhi Bank and Saudi Electricity Co. finished to the upside, gaining 2.86 percent and 1.02 percent respectively.

Weekly market breadth was unfavorable, with 66 stocks witnessing advances and 96 others marking a decline.

But upside-downside volume ratio of 1.3:1 remained positive.

Aldrees Petroleum & Transport Services Co. turned in a splendid performance among all Saudi stocks, soaring up 7.29 percent.

The company shares are trading near a four-year high before closing the week at SR68.88.

On the other side of the spectrum, Allied Cooperative Insurance Group showed the worst performance, turning down 27.64 percent for the week.

Alalamiya Cooperative Insurance and MedGulf Insurance followed it, declining by 15.02 percent and 10.39 percent respectively.

Alinma Bank with a volume of 123.8 million shares continued its most active status, capturing 16 percent of the overall market volume.

Banking sector is accounted for 28 percent of the total market liquidity.

Saudi Basic Industries Corp. (SABIC), the biggest market cap company, with a liquidity of SR3.1 billion topped the value chart, a relative market share of 12.2 percent.

Petrochemical sector is accounted for 24 percent of the total market turnover. The sector volume increased significantly by forty-one percent to 122.8 million shares.

Tadawul weekly turnover, however, improved by 7.3 percent on volume basis and 11.5 percent on value basis.

More than 770 million shares worth SR25.1 billion changed hands on the Saudi stock market.

Most of the major benchmark indices at GCC stock markets ended the week in red. Abu Dhabi Stock Exchange and Qatar Exchange ended the week in green, the indices increased by 0.37 percent and 0.15 percent respectively. Kuwait Stock Exchange fell 0.73 percent, followed by Muscat Securities Market and Dubai Financial Market with 0.41 percent and 0.22 percent respectively.

Share price of Kuwaiti Mobile Telecommunication Company (Zain) fell to a new ten-year low, a weekly reduction of 6.74 percent. At Abu Dhabi Stock Exchange shares of Emirates NBD decreased by 4.47 percent to AED9.20. OOREDOO shares price dropped by 3.82 percent on weekly basis to QR86.5 at Qatar Exchange.

Nearly 185 GCC stocks advanced and 267 declined last week.

Emirates Telecommunication Corp. showed the best performance among Large-caps in GCC region, posting 2.2 percent gain last week.

© Arab News 2015