By Mohamed Abu Meleeh
Riyadh – Mubasher: Saudi Stock Exchange (Tadawul) rose slightly on Sunday for the second successive day.
The benchmark index gained 4 points following volatile trading activity.
Sunday’s liquidity amounted to SAR 4.34 billion, which is the lowest since mid-November.
Analysts said the volatile trading is due to anticipation for the kingdom’s budget for the fiscal year 2016, which will be announced Monday. The state budget will show the impact of oil decline and will reveal spending levels.
The transportation sector was the biggest drag, with a fall of 4.36%, after Bahri stock dropped by 6.6% shrugging off a report that expected the company to become the world’s biggest oil transportation firm.
The media and publishing sector came second, with a decline of 3.77%, followed by energy that slipped by 0.97%. The petrochemical industries and real estate sector sagged 0.75% and 0.61% in a row.
Meanwhile, the hotel and tourism sector was the best performer, with a rise of 3.91%, followed by retail (+1.1%), then telecommunications (+0.96%) and banks (+0.72%).
Sunday’s traded volume decreased by 9.5% to 184 million shares from 203.7 million shares. Traded value also declined by 4.9% to SAR 4.3 billion from SAR 4.57 billion. The number of executed transactions retreated by 4.9% to 101,000 from 106,000.
Advancing stocks were led by Shams (+9.97%), then Alalamiya (+9.13%) and Al Tayyar (+4.85%). On the flipside, Bahri was the biggest drag (-6.6%) followed by Yansab (-5.29%) and Gulf Union (-5.13%).
Translated by Sayed Abdel Rahman
