(MENAFN - Arab News) The negativity continued to prevail at Saudi stock market yesterday. Bears tightened the grip further and dominated the trading activity at Tadawul.
The Tadawul All-Share Index (TASI) opened at 7,348.33 points yesterday, touched a peak of 7,378.40 earlier but abruptly changed its direction toward south, curved in the negative zone for rest of the trading session and closed red at 7277.89, down 70.44 points or 0.96 percent.
All Saudi sectors performed negatively, except Telecommunication & IT, which resisted the prevailing downward trend throughout the session but achieved a nominal 2.5 points or 0.12 percent for the entire day.
Banking sector also flip-flopped between green-red for most of the session but failed to cross the breakeven line in the end, pared only 14.98 points.
On the worst side, Multi-Investment sector slid further 138.34 points or 4.08 percent to close at 3,249.91. It became the biggest loser for the third consecutive day on Monday.
Most of heavy weights closed in red; where Saudi Electricity Co. sank 3.25 percent, Saudi Telecom 1.55 percent and Saudi Arabia Fertilizers Co. (SAFCO) 1.41 percent.
Samba Financial Group and Etihad Etisalat Co. (Mobily) performed well relatively and achieved a daily growth of 2.36 percent and 1.14 percent respectively.
Tadawul volume, however, improved by 20 percent as 644.1 million shares, worth SR11.6 billion changed hands during the day, an improvement from 534.5 million shares that were traded on Sunday.
Zain KSA with trades over 108.7 million shares occupied the title of volume leader. On the other hand, trading value was led by Alinma Bank, which pumped SR1.3 billion more to close at SR14.50.
Saudi Enaya Cooperative Insurance came out as significant gainer, up 4.98 percent to close the day at SR42.20.
NAMA Chemicals switched its position from top gainer of previous day to the biggest loser of the day, down 9.92 percent.
