Tadawul leads further day of GCC market losses

25 August 2015

Sell-off moderates but Saudi Arabia suffers

  • GCC stock markets continue to slip on falling oil and global financial turmoil
  • Saudi Arabia’s Tadawul drops by 5.88 per cent
  • Other GCC stock market losses moderate

GCC stock markets continued to fall in response to further falls in commodity and equity markets worldwide.

On the Saudi Stock Exchange (Tadawul), the Tadawul All Stocks Index (Tasi) fell 5.88 per cent to 7024.6 on 24 August, its lowest level since mid-2013.

It has now dropped 37 per cent in just under a year from its all-time high of 11,149.4 on 9 September 2014.  

Petrochemicals shares suffered heavily, falling by 7.26 per cent.

GCC equity falls in August 2015
MarketCountryDaily percentage changes to main index (20 August)Daily percentage changes to main index (23 August)Daily percentage changes to main index (24 August)Main index year-to-date
TadawulSaudi Arabia0.27-6.86-5.88-15.70
DFMUAE-3.22-6.96-1.44-9.87
ADXUAE-1.37-5.01-0.51-5.83
KSEKuwait-1.87-2.36-1.59-11.01
QEQatar-2.49-5.25-1.65-13.95
MSMOman-1.01-2.94-2.96-9.57
Bahrain BourseBahrain-0.42-0.37-0.80-8.56
Source: MEED

The losses are mainly due to falls in oil price, which reached new lows of $38.4 a barrel for West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude on 24 August, according to Nasdaq.

The global drops in commodity and stock markets continued. The Chinese stock market fell by 8.5 per cent, and other Asian, European and North American markets followed suit.

Commodity prices continued to plummet on fears that China, one of the biggest importers, would see demand would slow. Bloomberg’s commodity index fell 8.1 per cent on Monday, although gold prices began to recover.

GCC markets did not escape the turmoil, although losses were smaller than the previous two days of trading.

Oman’s Muscat Securities Market fell by 2.96 per cent. The Omani economy is seen as particularly vulnerable to oil shocks, and the country sold 72 per cent of its oil exports to China in 2014, according to the National Centre for Statistics & Information (NCSI).

The Qatar and Kuwait stock exchanges recorded losses of 1.65 per cent and 1.59 per cent respectively, while the Dubai Financial Market (DFM) index dropped 1.44 per cent.

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