KSE Price Index closes at 5,619.98 points
KUWAIT: Kuwait Stock Exchange (KSE) ended last week with mixed performance. The Price Index closed at 5,619.98 points, down by 0.07% from the week before closing, the Weighted Index decreased by 0.11% after closing at 380.98 points, whereas the KSX-15 Index closed at 902.52 points up by 0.04%. Furthermore, last week’s average daily turnover decreased by 28.80%, compared to the preceding week, reaching K.D 8.85 million, whereas trading volume average was 86.97 million shares, recording a loss of 8.50 %.
The stock market indicators ended the last week’s trading with mixed closings for the three indicators, whereas the Price and Weighted indices continued its decline for the fourth consecutive week, whilst the KSX-15 index was able to realize small gain due to the purchasing operations that targeted some heavy stocks. The market overall performance was negative, despite the fluctuation was witnessed throughout the week, which came among a continued presence of the negative factors and lack of supportive motivators for purchase, especially in light of the oil prices declines witnessed for a relatively long time, which pushed many investors towards selling fearing aggregation of the situation.
The market trading activity was limited to four sessions last week, whereas the first session witnessed a clear decrease for the three indicators, especially the Price Index which recorded big losses that pushed it to close at its lowest level since July 2004, in parallel with the noticeable slowing down of the trading activity during the session, as the volume reached its lowest level in four years, recording a drop of 31.83% compared to the previous session, whilst the value recorded a decline of 7.70% to reach its lowest level since last July.
However on the next session, the market was able to record various gains for the three indices, especially the Price Index which was able to compensate a small portion of the previous session’s losses, while the Weighted and KSX-15 indices were able to compensate all its losses ; and such performance came in light of the purchasing activities that were strongly present during that session, and concentrated on the stocks that declined and its prices reached low levels in previous sessions, and became tempting to buy.
On Tuesday’s session, the market witnessed mixed performance for the closing of its three indicators, whereas the Price Index continued to increase in light of the purchasing activity on the small-cap stocks which enabled it to compensate all of its losses made earlier in the week, while the Weighted and KSX-15 indices dropped as a result to the profit collection operations that included heavy stocks, to return once again to the red zone.
The market continued its mixed performance at the end of week session, which witnessed the return of the Price Index to drop and the Weighted and KSX-15 indices to increase once again, which came in light of the quick speculation and profit collection operations executed on the small-cap stocks, where the cosmetic purchasing operations witnessed during the session enabled the Weighted and KSX-15 indices to record limited gain by the end of the session.
The market capitalization for KSE reached by the end of last week KD 25.28 billion, declining by 0.51%, compared to its level in a week earlier, which was KD 25.40 billion. On an annual level, the market cap for the listed companies in KSE declined by 9.67% from its value at end of 2004, where it was KD 27.98. As far as KSE annual performance, the Price Index ended last week recording 14.01% annual loss compared to its closing in 2014, while the Weighted Index decreased by 13.19%, and the KSX-15 contracted by 14.85%.
Sectors’ Indices
Seven of KSE’s sectors ended last week in the green zone, while the other five recorded declines. Last week’s highest gainer was the Consumer Goods sector, achieving 2.49% growth rate as its index closed at 1,078.31 points. Whereas, in the second place, the Basic Materials sector’s index closed at 982.78 points recording 2.38% increase. The Oil & Gas sector came in third as its index achieved 2.22% growth, ending the week at 808.60 points. On the other hand, the Health Care sector headed the losers list as its index declined by 1.28% to end the week’s activity at 955.98 points. The Industrial sector was second on the losers’ list, which index declined by 1.15%, closing at 1,048.02 points, followed by the Technology sector, as its index closed at 851.47 points at a loss of 0.93%.
Sectors’ Activity
The Financial Services sector dominated a total trade volume of around 160.59 million shares changing hands during last week, representing 46.16% of the total market trading volume. The Real Estate sector was second in terms of trading volume as the sector’s traded shares were 27.65% of last week’s total trading volume, with a total of around 96.18 million shares. On the other hand, the Banks sector’s stocks were the highest traded in terms of value; with a turnover of around KD 13.24 million or 37.38% of last week’s total market trading value. The Financial Services sector took the second place as the sector’s last week turnover was approx. KD 6.01 million representing 16.96% of the total market trading value.