1. Home
  2. المقالات
  3. Capital Market
  • February 9, 2021

    Central Bank of Kuwait Allows Banks to Distribute 2020 Dividends

    Central Bank of Kuwait (CBK) has been at the forefront and took various measures to limit the impact of COVID-19 pandemic on Kuwait economy and the banking sector. Some of the key measures taken by the central bank include reduction in discount rate to a historically low level of 1.50% from 2.75% and maximization of lending capacity of banks to provide financing by allowing use of capital conservation buffers (2.5% of capital) for capital adequacy ratio. In 2020, some countries...

  • January 14, 2021

    Major Global Investment Themes of 2020 – Tech stocks and Cryptocurrencies

    التكنولوجيا stocks benefit from the pandemic and significantly outperform the benchmark index The top tech companies in the world were among the big winners with the pandemic accelerating the adoption of technology. Apple, Amazon, Netflix, Google, Facebook and Microsoft stocks saw huge gains this year as demand for e-commerce, online advertising and cloud computing during the pandemic led to soaring revenues. Social distancing guidelines resulted in many employees working from home. The biggest winner due to this shift was Zoom...

  • January 13, 2021

    Oil Performance & Outlook – Positive Signals Abound

    Oil markets were hit hard by Covid-19 pandemic and suffered losses of 21.5% in 2020. US Oil prices even went negative for a brief period in April. However, the markets initially staged a ‘relief rally’ from the lows in April/May as Oil producing countries together announced cuts in productions. Oil prices then began a period of ‘cyclical consolidation’ with prices around the USD 40/barrel mark until November. Then began the stage of ‘structural repricing’ aided by various factors. Vaccine announcements,...

  • January 12, 2021

    Vaccine approval helps GCC markets recover most of the year’s losses

    GCC stocks staged a strong recovery towards the end of the year after seeing a sharp fall in March and April due to oil prices crashing and fears of sharp economic slowdown due to Covid-19. The benchmark S&P GCC Composite index recovered from the lows and ended the year with a fall of just 1.7%. GCC markets rose in November after pharmaceutical firms Pfizer, Moderna and AstraZeneca announced favorable news on COVID-19 vaccine development. Subsequently, several governments including many GCC...

  • January 10, 2021

    A recap of Global Markets in 2020

    Global stocks staged a quick recovery from the March lows The year began with global stock markets reaching new highs in February. However, global markets saw massive falls in March as the COVID-19 outbreak became a global pandemic. At its lowest point in March, the S&P 500 saw a drawdown of 34% from the record highs seen just a month earlier in February. However, the index recovered the losses and reached new highs by October in a mere time span...

  • December 9, 2020

    Kuwait and GCC Blue Chip Earnings

    Kuwait Earnings November saw a number of blue chip companies in Kuwait and GCC declare their financial results for the third quarter (Q3) of 2020. The earnings of Kuwaiti blue chip companies saw a decrease in Q3-2020 compared to that of the same period in 2019 as seen from the exhibit below. Exhibit 1: Q3 earnings of top 5 Kuwaiti companies by Market Capitalisation Source: Boursa Kuwait; Reuters; Data as of November 29, 2020 Commentary: National Bank of Kuwait: Net...

  • December 8, 2020

    Stock Market Commentary: Vaccine optimism drives all markets higher

    All GCC equity markets ended the month in green as oil prices jumped by 27% for the month after pharmaceutical firms Pfizer, Moderna and AstraZeneca announced favorable news on COVID-19 vaccine development that rose investor hopes of quick recovery. Kuwait stock markets rose for the month with the Kuwait Main Market index registering a gain of 1.6%. Kuwait All Share index gained of 0.3% while its index PE ratio stood at 20, a premium of 33% compared to S&P GCC...

  • December 7, 2020

    MSCI includes Kuwait stocks in their Emerging Markets indices

    Morgan Stanley Capital International (MSCI), the world’s largest index provider, reclassified Kuwait to ‘Emerging Markets’ status from ‘Frontier Markets’. The inclusion to the Emerging Market Index took place on Nov. 30, 2020 after market close, while the deletion of Kuwaiti securities from the Frontier Markets 100 index will be phased over five successive index reviews. The implementation was originally slated to take place in May 2020 but was delayed because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Seven Kuwaiti Stocks have been added...

  • November 9, 2020

    IMF forecasts steeper fall in GCC countries’ 2020 GDP

    As the world charts its recovery from COVID-19’s impact amidst the resurgence of cases in some countries and lingering threat of spike in others, the countries’ recovery path and economic outlook are being closely watched. IMF in its recent World Economic Outlook (October 2020) has revised GDP forecasts for GCC countries downwards from its April forecast, citing deeper-than-expected impact of lockdowns on mobility and weak global growth. For GCC as a whole, IMF expects GDP to contract by 6% in...

  • November 8, 2020

    Steep cut in project spending could depress Kuwait’s oil output

    Oil majors around the world are scaling back their investment plans on the back of drastic fall in oil prices driven by lockdowns to curb COVID-19 and the current stagnation in prices. Kuwait had also announced plans to slash capital spending in its oil sector by around KD 700million from KD 3.7billion (USD 12.2billion) to KD 3billion (USD 9.9billion) during the 2020-2021 fiscal year due to a sharp rise in the country's budget deficits. State operator, Kuwait Petroleum Corporation (KPC)...