By Mohamed Abu Meleeh
Riyadh – Mubasher: Saudi stock market Tadawul fell on Tuesday by 0.88% or 61.59 points as it trimmed nearly two thirds of its early losses of 174.7 points (3.38%). It closed at 6,755.87 points, down from 6,930.60 points yesterday.
The market was dragged by the announcement of the kingdom’s budget that showed a deficit of SAR 367 billion in 2015 as revenues and spending reached SAR 608 billion and SAR 975 billion respectively.
Saudi Arabia also announced estimated budget for 2016 with SAR 513 billion revenues and SAR 840 billion spending, thus registering a deficit of SAR 327 billion.
Nine sectors were in red led by energy that dropped by 5.26% after rose yesterday to its highest levels in two months. The remaining six sectors were in green topped by insurance (+5.19%) and banks (+0.54%).
Tuesday’s traded volume rose by 25.6% to 320 million shares from 255.6 million shares. Traded value also increased by 33.9% to SAR 6.9 billion from SAR 5.2 billion and the number of transactions rose to 148,900 from 111,000.
98 stocks headed north spearheaded by Alinma Tokio Marine (+9.95%), then Buruj (+9.74%), Medgulf (+9.74%) and Salama (+9.63%). Meanwhile, 65 other stocks headed south led by Petrochem (-6.85%), then Yansab (-6.71%), SIIG (-6.65%) and Sipchem (-5.95%).
The plunge in petrochemical stocks was triggered by the Saudi Cabinet’s decision late Monday to raise energy prices.
The Cabinet approved new tariffs for electricity, which included a rise in consumption prices for housing and governmental sectors. It also endorsed changes to domestic energy prices, which included a rise in fuel prices.
The kingdom raised the price of gas to $1.25 per million British thermal units (mmbtu), ethane to $1.75 per mmbtu, kerosene to $25.70 per barrel.
Diesel prices were also raised to $14.00 per barrel, light Arab crude to $6.35 per barrel, heavy crude 180 to $3.80 per barrel. 91 octane gasoline price was raised to SAR 0.75 per litre, while 95 octane gasoline price was increased to SAR 0.90 per litre.
Translated by Sayed Abdel Rahman
