(MENAFN- Gulf Times) An across-the-board selling, particularly in the telecom stocks, on Wednesday snapped four days of bullish momentum on the Qatar Stock Exchange.
Domestic institutions' increased net buying notwithstanding, the 20-stock Qatar Index (based on price data) dropped 1.11% to 12,127.98 points as trade volumes also fell.
The index that tracks Shariah-principled stocks was seen melting slower than the other indices in the bourse, which is down 1.28% year-to-date.
Foreign institutions were seen increasingly profit-takers and non-Qatari retail investors continued to be net sellers but with lesser intensity in the market, where realty, banking and industrials stocks together cornered about 70% of the total trading volume.
Market capitalisation shed 0.98%, or about QR7bn, to QR658.96bn with mid, large, micro and small cap equities losing 1.3%, 0.92%, 0.82% and 0.32% respectively.
The Total Return Index lost 0.93% to 18,603.14 points, the All Share Index by 0.8% to 3,212.3 points and the Al Rayan Islamic Index by 0.54% to 4,404.41 points.
Telecom stocks plummeted 3.08%, followed by realty (0.88%), industrials (0.83%), transport (0.67%), insurance (0.56%), banks and financial services (0.54%) and consumer goods (0.42%).
More than 70% of the stocks were in the red with major losers being Ooredoo, Nakilat, Mazaya Qatar, Ezdan, Barwa, Industries Qatar, Mesaieed Petrochemical Holding, Commercial Bank, Doha Bank, QNB, Masraf Al Rayan and Vodafone Qatar; even as International Islamic and Alijarah Holding bucked the trend.
Foreign institutions' net profit-booking strengthened to QR39.43mn against QR17.37mn the previous day.
Non-Qatari individual investors' net selling fell to QR12.23mn compared to QR22.27mn on Tuesday.
Domestic institutions' net buying soared to QR47.74mn against QR36.72mn on March 10.
Qatari retail investors' net buying rose to QR3.9mn compared to QR2.93mn the previous day.
Total trade volume fell 36% to 6.09mn shares, value by 30% to QR293.4mn and transactions by 14% to 4,051.
The consumer goods sector's trade volume plummeted 72% to 0.27mn stocks, value by 36% to QR17.11mn and deals by 36% to 259.
There was a 52% plunge in the real estate's trade volume to 1.43mn equities, 60% in value to QR42.13mn and 41% in transactions to 603.
The telecom sector's trade volume tanked 38% to 0.99mn shares, value by 4% to QR33.7mn and deals by 8% to 681.
The industrials sector saw its trade volume decline 29% to 1.01mn stocks, value by 17% to QR71.77mn and transactions by 11% to 1,027.
The market saw a 22% fall in the insurance sector's trade volume to 0.07mn equities, 22% in value to QR5.79mn and 29% in deals to 50.
The banks and financial services sector's trade volume shrank 17% to 1.82mn shares, value by 20% to QR106.82mn and transactions by 2% to 1,168.
However, the transport sector's trade volume more than doubled to 0.51mn stocks but value lost 32% to QR16.02mn, even as deals more than doubled to 263.
In the debt market, there was no trading of treasury bills and government bonds.
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