Most major Gulf stock indexes fell at Wednesday's open, with Abu Dhabi dragged down by its top lender, but Oman bucked the trend as financial stocks led a sharp rise as the market reopened after a three-day break.
Oman's blue-chip bourse, which had closed following the death of Sultan Qaboos bin Said, rose 1.5% for its biggest intraday gain this month. Bank Muscat rose 3.7%, while Raysut Cement was up 7.6% after reporting a large rise in full-year net profit.
Saudi Arabia's benchmark index edged down 0.1%, hurt by a 0.6% fall in Saudi Aramco and a 0.7% drop in Saudi British Bank.
On Wednesday, JP Morgan initiated coverage of state-owned Aramco with an "overweight" rating and price target of 37 riyals ($9.86), a stronger recommendation than Goldman Sachs' "neutral" and Morgan Stanley's "underweight" ratings.
The Abu Dhabi index lost 0.4% as the country's largest lender First Abu Dhabi Bank eased 0.6% and realtor Aldar Properties slipped 0.9%.
In Qatar, the index slipped 0.1% with market heavyweight Industries Qatar declining 1.3%, while Qatar National Bank was down 0.3%, despite reporting a rise in annual profit.
The lender reported a net profit of 14.4 billion riyals ($3.96 billion) in 2019, up from 13.8 billion riyals a year earlier.
The index found some support from Qatar Islamic Bank, which was up 1.3%.
Dubai's main share index edged up 0.2% with Emirates NBD Bank and Emaar Properties gaining 0.4% and 0.5%, respectively.
($1 = 3.7516 riyals) ($1 = 3.6400 Qatar riyals)
(Reporting by Ateeq Shariff in Bengaluru; Editing by Kirsten Donovan) ((AteeqUr.Shariff@thomsonreuters.com; +918067497129;))
