Most major bourses in the Gulf rose on Tuesday as oil prices held near one-year highs.
Saudi Arabia’s Tadawul All-Share Index (TASI) gained 1.5 percent, trimming its loss over the last four weeks to 8.4 percent. All 14 listed petrochemical producers advanced after Brent oil futures surged as much as 3 percent on Monday. Saudi Basic Industries, which has not yet reported its third-quarter results, added 0.6 percent.
The positive mood spilled into other sectors with rebounds in some shares that had been beaten down over the last several weeks by the government’s spending cuts. Retailer Fawaz Alhokair jumped 3.9 percent and supermarket operator Al-Othaim added 3.4 percent.
But Riyad Bank, the first Saudi bank to report third-quarter earnings, dropped 2.1 percent after it posted an 18.9 percent fall in net profit as costs rose.
It made SR729 million ($194.4 million) in the three months to Sept. 30, down from SR899 million in the same period of 2015. Analysts polled by Reuters had on average forecast SR1.05 billion.
In a recent report, Jadwa Investment said TASI dropped by 8 percent month-on-month in September, resulting in a third consecutive deadline in monthly performance.
Traded volumes have been dropping since May, in-line with the extended holiday period with September volumes 0.4 ?considerably lower than year-to-date volumes.
“We do, however, expect volumes to pick up,” Jadwa researchers added.
The downtrend in the TASI has been mirrored in the decline in the key valuation metric of price-to-earning (PE).
PE has trended downwards since May.
Although this is partially due to slower trading during the summer months, it also reflects investor caution over expected profitability of listed companies in the near term, added the report.

In Qatar the main index closed up 0.3 percent as Qatar National Bank, the largest listed share, gained 0.5 percent after it reported a 10.2 percent increase in third-quarter net profit to 3.45 billion riyals ($947.5 million). Aalysts had forecast 3.26 billion riyals.
Dubai’s main index rose 1.0 percent as nine-tenths of traded stocks advanced. Drake & Scull, the most heavily traded stock, jumped 4.2 percent; the builder had surged 7.0 percent on Monday after appointing a new chief operating officer, Wael Allan, replacing Khaldoun Tabari, a major shareholder.
Emaar Properties climbed 0.6 percent. On Monday the developer started building what it said would be the world’s tallest tower, another record for a company that built the highest skyscraper, Burj Khalifa.
Blue chips helped lift Kuwait’s general index 1.1 percent. National Bank of Kuwait, the largest Kuwaiti lender, rose 1.7 percent and telecommunications operator Zain added 1.5 percent.
But Abu Dhabi’s index lagged, dipping 0.3 percent. Large-cap banks were the main drag with First Gulf Bank dropping 1.7 percent.

EGYPT

Egypt’s main index retreated 1.6 percent to 8,233 points with investment firm Qalaa Holdings tumbling 5.3 percent, taking its loss over the last three days to nearly 20 percent after it reported a sharply wider quarterly net loss.
All but three of the traded shares in the index declined. The largest lender, Commercial International Bank, fell 1.5 percent.

Source: Arab News