S&P GCC index falls by 2% in November
The decline was mainly due to sharp fall in oil prices, continued trade war uncertainties and geo-political concerns
Times News Service
MUSCAT: The S&P GCC index took a downturn in the month of November. The index fell 2 per cent for the month, drawing down on the overall gains for the year, which now stand at 7.6 per cent, according to Kuwait Financial Centre’s (Markaz) latest report.
This was mainly due to the sharp fall in oil prices, the continued trade war uncertainties and geo-political concerns, Markaz said in its recently released Monthly Markets Review report for November.
The report said that Saudi Arabia, Abu Dhabi and Dubai saw large pullbacks with the Saudi Tadawul index, Abu Dhabi index and the DFM General Index falling 2.6 per cent, 2.7 per cent and 4.2 per cent for the month of November, respectively.
Overall, Qatar and Bahrain indices gained 0.6 per cent, and 1.1 per cent respectively, whereas, the Oman and Abu Dhabi index lost 0.2 per cent and 2.7 per cent during the month. Ezdan holdings and Masraf Al Raya were the top two performers among GCC blue chip companies, rising by 16.4 per cent and 5.5 per cent during the month respectively.
The report stated that Kuwait finally broke out of its three-month losing streak and became the best performing market in the GCC region for the month of November.
The Kuwait All Share Index gained 1.3 per cent for the month with the YTD returns moving up to 8.4 per cent as investors welcomed the initiatives by Central Bank of Kuwait (CBK) to revive the credit growth and boost consumer spending by increasing the personal loan limit. The oil market was under intense selling pressure we saw an acceleration in price fall. Record high oil production from the United States and a slowing global demand for the commodity could be cited as reasons for the negative performance. Opec is preparing to rein its output on expectations that the oil market will be oversupplied next year. Brent crude continued to fall adding to its momentum from last month, with a MTD performance of -22.2 per cent.
Saudi Market continued to be in focus during November as geopolitical turbulence and a continued drop in oil prices maintained a grip on the market prices.