Muscat shares make negligible gains 

(MENAFN - Times of Oman) The MSM-30 index ended a tad higher gaining 0.10 per cent to 4681.17. Market breadth was negative with 24 securities declining against 13 gaining. Bank Muscat rose by nearly 8 per cent to RO0.542. Among other major gainers, Global Financial Investment rose 2.3 per cent to RO0.132 and Oman Cables Industry climbed 1.73 per cent to RO0.765.

Banking and investment sector posted marginal gains while service and insurance sector and industry sector declined by 1.23 per cent and 0.48 per cent respectively.

Elsewhere in the Gulf, UAE stocks dropped, led by real-estate and construction companies. Drake & Scull International PJSC plummeted as much as 30 per cent on its first trading day. Emaar Properties PJSC, the country's largest real-estate developer, fell for the first time in four days. Arkan Building Materials Co. dropped to the lowest in more than a year. Drake & Scull, which sold shares last year, traded as low as Dhs0.7."This is a reflection of the negative sentiment in the real-estate sector in Dubai," said Samer Al Jaouni, GM, Middle East Financial Brokerage Co in Dubai.The Dubai Financial Market General Index fell one per cent to 1,509.71 and Abu Dhabi's ADX General Index lost 0.7 per cent.

Dubai's residential real-estate prices may slump about 38 per cent this year as the emirate's economy is hurt by the global credit crisis, Reuters reported yesterday, citing its own survey of analysts.

Construction companies in the UAE have scaled back projects and cut jobs as the first simultaneous recession for six decades in the US, Japan and Europe curbed demand and financing for properties.