(MENAFN - Arab News) A huge tug of war was going on between the bulls and bears at Saudi stock market last week but it ended in a standoff as the market retreated all the way to 7,540.27 points, which was roughly where it started the week.
The powerful trading waves rose to high over and over again and Tadawul made some new records during the week.
A persistent increase in trading activity raised the Tadawul volume to 4.5 billion shares, up 30.2 percent over last week's volume when 3.4 billion shares changed hands. Investors continued to boost the liquidity further to SR92.8 billion for the week.
The Tadawul All-Share Index (TASI) closed the week at 7,540.27, down 27.7 points or 0.37 percent, from its previous weekend close at 7,567.98 points. It suffered a largest dip of 97.35 points on Tuesday, which turned the intra-week gains into mild losses.
Sectoral performance was mixed during the week, as the losses made by the Cement (-6.36 percent) and Insurance (-2.14 percent) being offset by rise in Energy & Utilities (3.76 percent), Transport (3.0 percent) and Real Estate Development (2.76 percent).
Total market capitalization of Saudi stock exchange remained nearly unchanged from its previous level of SR1.49 trillion.
Alinma Bank and Mobile Telecommunications Company (Zain) remained as most active stocks of the week. Alinma Bank pumped more liquidity into the market by contributing over SR10.1 billion, which is approximately 11 percent of overall market turnover. Zain KSA stood parallel with more than 894.6 million shares, capturing a relative market share of 20 percent.
Weekly market breadth was negative with 89 stocks witnessing declines against 55 stocks registering advances and the prices of 8 companies remained unchanged.
Allianz Saudi Fransi Coop. Insurance switched its position from worst performer of the previous week to the biggest gainer of the week, up 15.45 percent. It was followed by Saudi Industrial Development which advanced over 14.02 percent.
On the worst side, Cement stocks suffered profit-taking last week with Saudi Cement Co. tumbled 14.09 percent and Eastern Province Cement dipped by 13.5 percent.
Major benchmark indices at GCC stock markets ended the week with mild losses as they have been unable to gather any upward momentum.
The benchmark GulfBase GCC General Index also lost 22.71 points or 0.55 percent for the entire week to close at 4128.7 points level.
