Bahrain Bourse gains for seventh straight month

The Bahrain Bourse (BHB) notched up the seventh consecutive month of gains during October supported by a broad-based rally, showed a new report.

Kuwait-based Kamco Invest’s review of the GCC equity markets found that the Bahrain All Share index increased by 2.2 per cent last month to close at 1,743.06 points.

In terms of year-to-date (YTD-2021) performance, the index is up 17pc for the first ten months of the year, the fourth highest in the GCC.

On the sectoral front, five out of the seven sectors on BHB registered a monthly surge contributing to the overall gain in the main index.

The materials sector topped on the gainers side with an uptick of 5.1pc during October-2021 followed by the financial and the real estate indices with increases of 2.3pc and 1.2pc, respectively.

On the flip side, the industrial and the consumer discretionary were the only two sectors to report declines during the month.

In terms of stock performance, the monthly gainers chart was topped by Cineco with its shares soaring 22.6pc followed by GFH Financial Group and Inovest with gains of 14.4pc and 12.1pc, respectively.

Nass Corp led the decliners recording a drop of 15pc fall in its share prices during last month, followed by Trafco Group and Gulf Hotel Group which saw their share prices recede by 4pc and 1.5pc respectively.

The surge in Cineco shares during October 2021 has been mainly attributed to the economy opening up and people going back to cinemas.

GFH’s share price rising during the month has been attributed to the diversification of its investments.

Recently, the Sharia-compliant investment firm announced plans to repurchase 10pc of its issued shares.

During the month, it also announced an offer to acquire 100pc shares of Khaleeji Commercial Bank (KHCB) with an aim to expand its portfolio and operations.

GFH made an offer to acquire the remaining 21.03pc in KHCB that it does not own through a shares swap transaction.

Post-acquisition, GFH plans to retain KHCB’s commercial registration and its status as an Islamic retail bank with normal business operations.

Trading activity on BHB was mixed during October 2021.

Total volume of shares traded rose by 25.6pc to 97m shares in October 2021 as compared to 77.3m shares during September-2021.

On the other hand, value of shares traded during the month dropped by 6.4pc to BD17.4m as compared to BD18.5m during the previous month.

GFH topped the monthly volume traded chart in the second month running with 51.4m traded shares followed by Al Salam Bank-Bahrain and Ahli United Bank at 15m shares and 9.1m shares, respectively.

The firm was the best on the value traded chart too, with BD11.3m worth of shares traded during the month followed by Ahli United Bank and Alba at BD8.6m and BD3.5m, respectively.

As for the GCC region, equity markets witnessed gains for the 12th consecutive month, with the MSCI GCC index rising 3.1pc in October 2021 supported by consistent gains since the start of the month that were partially offset by a 1.6pc decline in the last week.

The monthly gains pushed GCC’s YTD-21 returns to one of the highest globally at 36.1pc.

Kuwait was the best performing market in the GCC during the month with a gain of 3.5pc backed by gain in stocks in the main market.

The GCC sectoral performance chart for last month showed mid-to-low single digit gains for largecap sectors including banks, energy and utilities.

Gains for the banking sector were mainly led by solid earnings announced by most banks in the region, while energy stocks reflected the consistent gain in oil prices.

On the other hand, sectors that reported increases during the pandemic including pharma and biotech, consumer durables and apparel, and food and beverage were the biggest losers during October 2021, partially offsetting the overall gains.

In terms of YTD-21 performance, the banking index now ranks second in the GCC after the capital goods index (up 50.2pc) with a gain of 47.3pc.

Diversified financials and materials followed with jumps of 43.9pc and 38.6pc, respectively.

The food and drug retailing index was the only sector in the red with a decline of 2.4pc last month.

Source: https://www.gdnonline.com/Details/992162/Bahrain-Bourse-gains-for-seventh-straight-month