Kuwait Stock Exchange’s Weekly Activity, 20-Aug-2015

Kuwait Stock Exchange (KSE) ended last week in the red zone. The Price Index closed at 6,052.63 points, down by 3.94% from the week before closing, the Weighted Index decreased by 3.65% after closing at 402.80 points, whereas the KSX-15 Index closed at 966.98 points down by 3.52%. Furthermore, last week’s average daily turnover decreased by 1.28%, compared to the preceding week, reaching K.D 11.70 million, whereas trading volume average was 106.03 million shares, recording a decrease of 20.01 %.The three stock market indicators recorded losses as a result to the continued presence of many negative factors that pushed some investors to execute random selling operations from one side, and caused many of them to refrain from trading until positive motivators arise on the other side. Also, the stock market indicators ended the last week’s trading with big losses in parallel with the grouped declines recorded by the GCC stock markets during the week, and the market was affected by the action taken against some companies’ stock by stopping it from being traded because such companies could not disclose its first half 2015 financial results before the end of the legal disclosure period. In addition, the negative influence is still controlling the trading behaviour in the market among a dropped investors’ confidence and decreased trading activity, as the market was subject to a violent selling trend for profit collection, concentrated on the stocks of previous good gains, both the large-cap and small-cap stocks.In addition, the stock market initiated the week’s trading with a negative performance affected by the sharp selling operations witnessed by most of the traded stocks, in parallel with a noticeable decline in the trading activity, especially the cash liquidity that reached by the end of the first session K.D. 8.91 million, and the selling operations concentrated during the session on the large-cap stocks which had a negative impact on the three indices’ performance, especially KSX-15 index which closed below 1,000 point level for the first time this year. Also, the stock market continued its downward direction and the losses recording in the second session of the week, due to the strong selling pressures that included large-cap and small-cap stocks due to the fears that over controlled the traders especially in light of the negative situations that the GCC and international stock markets are suffering from.

On Tuesday’s session, the stock market witnessed mixed closing for the three, whereas the Price Index and the Weighted Index declined under the influence of the profit collection operations that concentrated on some small-cap and speculative stocks, whilst the strong purchasing operations executed on few large-cap stocks enabled KSX-15 Index from ending the session in the green zone. On Wednesday’s session, the three stock indicators returned to the grouped losses once again, whereas the market witnessed a strong profit collection trend caused many stocks’ prices to drop, despite the relatively good growth in the cash liquidity compared to the previous session. However in the last trading session of the week, the stock market indicators ended the session with large losses and included a wide ray of listed stocks, especially the small-cap ones, which caused the Price Index to decline steeply and reach almost below the 6,000 point level, losing more than 115 point by the end of the session, and enlarged its weekly losses in a great deal.

As far as KSE annual performance, the Price Index ended last week recording 7.39% annual loss compared to its closing in 2014, while the Weighted Index decreased by 8.22%, and the KSX-15 recorded 8.77% loss.

Sectors’ Indices

All of KSE’s sectors ended last week in the red zone. Last week’s highest loser was the Telecommunication sector headed the losers list as its index declined by 7.93% to end the week’s activity at 576.80 points. The Industrial sector was second on the losers’ list, which index declined by 5.10%, closing at 1,125.99 points, followed by the Financial Services sector, as its index closed at 702.98 points at a loss 4.49%.

Sectors’ Activity

The Real Estate sector dominated a total trade volume of around 212.70 million shares changing hands during last week, representing 40.12% of the total market trading volume. The Financial Services sector was second in terms of trading volume as the sector’s traded shares were 24.90% of last week’s total trading volume, with a total of around 132.02 million shares.

On the other hand, the Banks sector’s stocks were the highest traded in terms of value; with a turnover of around K.D 14.09 million or 24.09% of last week’s total market trading value. The Industrial sector took the second place as the sector’s last week turnover was approx. K.D 10.67 million representing 18.24% of the total market trading value.