Gulf markets rise in early trade, Kuwait continues bull run
Gulf stock markets mostly rose in early trade on Monday with Kuwait continuing a bull run that has made it by far the region’s best-performing bourse this year.
The Kuwaiti index, which rose 15.6 per cent between the end of last year and Sunday, added a further 1.1 per cent on Monday morning. Trading volume looked set to surpass Sunday’s very high level and hit a new 43-month high.
The country’s biggest bank, National Bank of Kuwait, climbed 1.5 per cent and logistics giant Agility surged 4.4 per cent.
The Kuwait market is not cheap. NBK is trading at a trailing price-earnings ratio of above 14 times, for example, compared to below 12 times for Qatar National Bank and below 10 times for Abu Dhabi’s First Gulf Bank, Thomson Reuters data shows.
But fund managers said the volume of money pouring into the Kuwaiti market because of its momentum suggested the bull run might continue for a while.
Saudi Arabia’s index added 0.8 per cent. Builder Khodari, which jumped 9.1 per cent on Sunday on hopes for a recovery in the Saudi construction sector after the government began paying overdue debts to companies, rose a further 2.6 per cent.
Banks rebounded after dropping earlier this week on disappointing fourth-quarter earnings. Saudi British Bank rose 3.3 per cent after falling 1.6 per cent on Sunday.
In Dubai, the index edged up 0.1 per cent as Dubai Islamic Bank climbed 1.3 per cent. Qatar also gained 0.1 per cent as Doha Bank rose 2.2 per cent.
The bank reported an 84.8 per cent decline in fourth-quarter net profit to 35 million Qatari riyals. Three analysts polled by Reuters had forecast on average the bank would make a quarterly net profit of 215.58m riyals.
But Doha Bank also said its board was recommending a cash dividend of 3 riyals per share for 2016, the same level as in 2015.
Source: TheNational
