Dubai stocks maintain profits
The Dubai stock market strengthened on Sunday, building on a 7.0 surge it made before its weekend on Thursday, lifted by property giant Emaar's decision to abandon a merger with state-owned entities.
By midday, the Dubai Financial Market index was trading 3.76 percent up at 1,702.45 points, after it had opened 0.9 percent up.
The value of trades also increased by midday from 16.3 million dirhams (4.4 million dollars) to 814.7 million dirhams (222 million dollars).
Emaar Properties, the largest Middle East real estate firm by market capitalisation, saw its shares rocket on Thursday by 14.84 percent, narrowly missing the maximum-allowed daily increase of 15 percent.
On Sunday, Emaar shares were trading more than 8.0 percent up.
"Now with the overhang cleared, we believe investors should direct their focus back to Emaar's fundamental value as a standalone entity," EFG-Hermes investment bank said in a report on Sunday, referring to Emaar's decision last week to cancel a merger with the property arm of government-owned Dubai Holding.
"Given the positive nature of this announcement coupled with Emaar's prominence on the DFM, we believe there could be some positive reaction, albeit likely to be short-lived," it added.
The shares of leading construction firm, Arabtec, were also up over 7.0 percent, while the stocks of budget airline Air Arabia were up just over 1.0 percent.
Dubai Islamic Bank shares meanwhile appeared to shrug off a rate downgrading by Moody's as they surged by nearly 10 percent. Emirates NBD bank, also downgraded, seemed to react negatively, dropping by over 4.0 percent.
Comments