DOHA: Qatar bourse rose near to a new 52-week high on the back of strong gains by telecoms and banking & financial services indices. The QE index that extended its rally yesterday added 19.17 points or 0.20 percent to close at 9,671.84 points, heading to the psychological 10,000 levels.
The benchmark index rose 15.71 percent year-to-date. Market capitalisation increased to QR530.44bn.
The Telecoms and Banking & Financial sector indices were up 2.11 points and 0.09 points respectively.
Ooredoo, Masraf Al Rayan, Doha Bank and Al Meera were the top gainers. Ooredoo was up 2.62 percent to QR133.40. Lender Masraf Al Rayan rose 1.98 percent to QR28.30after posting estimate-beating 13.2 percent growth in its first half 2013 results. Doha Bank gained 0.73 percent to QR48.45 and Almeera was up by 0.65 percent to QR139.20.
Market analysts commented QE’s extending rally is due to the investor’s growing confidence in MSCI’s decision to elevate Qatari market to the Emerging status. “There are great expectations that the upgrade would channellise fresh foreign investments to Qatar. The rally extensions show the MSCI decision has boosted the market fundamentals”, an analyst at Al Rayan Investment told The Peninsula. In terms of dividends, Qatari companies are slowly catching up with the UAE bourses. “This is another reason for investors growing interests in Qatari market”, he noted.
The MSCI Emerging Markets Index, which tracks $7.3 trillion of equities around the world, is considered the premium list of growing markets, including countries such as China, Brazil and India. Qatar’s upgrade to the emerging market from the frontier one in the index is expected to take effect on May 31, 2014.
Qatar’s underperforming market has seen a surge in international buying over the last few weeks as investors look for value after the MSCI elevated its status from the frontier one to the emerging one.
The volume of the shares traded on the bourse decreased to 5.3m from 5.8m on Monday. The value of shares decreased to QR 233m from QR307m.
The Peninsula
