Saudi- Petchem stocks spur Tadawul 

(MENAFN - Arab News) Saudi Arabia's stock market made its largest one-day gain in 10 weeks yesterday, rallying to a seven-week high as petrochemicals stocks rose on bargain hunting and most other Gulf bourses also gained.

Saudi Basic Industries Corp. (SABIC) climbed 2.3 percent, National Industrialization rose 2.6 percent and Saudi Arabian Fertilizers added 1.9 percent.

Saudi petrochemical and banking shares suffered heavy losses after broadly disappointing third-quarter earnings, dragging the benchmark back to July levels, but analysts said this selling was overdone and had forecast share prices would recover after the Eid Al-Adha holidays ended on Nov. 2.
"Petchem stocks were hammered with the results and keeping in mind global markets just opened yesterday and oil is up, this is opportunity buying," Tariq Alalaiwat, equity research analyst at NCB Capital, told Reuters.

Brent crude rose more than 1 a barrel yesterday. Saudi's bank index rose 1.2 percent. Banque Saudi Fransi and Samba Financial Group were the main gainers, rising 3.3 and 2 percent respectively.

The main benchmark index climbed 1.1 percent to close at its highest level since Sept. 25.