Oil

Flat July for GCC Markets

Blue chips drove Qatar’s index surge, with real estate (8.52%), telecoms (7.94%) and banking stocks (7.1%) performing well in July. The recently announced Qatar’s fuel subsidy reform will also help shrink its budget deficit by reducing expenditures; a move that will help investments in private sector. Saudi index fell due to fall in oil price, and the continued resilience of shale oil, as increasingly efficient US shale production continues to drive a wedge in OPEC’s strategy of flooding the market...

MENA Markets Mixed, Oil Flat Post – Brexit

S&P GCC rose marginally by 1.1% in June, to close at 91 points. Global investor reaction to the Brexit outcome had unnerved GCC investors, and speculation over a possible contagion in Europe had led to panic driven trading in the last two weeks of June. Investors have become more risk averse as uncertainty continues to plague global markets. In terms of valuation, P/E of Morocco (16.8x), Jordan (14.2x) and Kuwait (13.5x) markets were the premium markets in the MENA region,...

MENA Markets Break its Correlation to Oil

S&P GCC also declined by 5.1% in May, to close at 90 points. Worries over contraction in the construction industry and possibility of rise in provisions and non-performing loans in regional banks made investors wary of taking long-term positions in banking and construction shares, despite positive Q1 results for the former. MENA markets liquidity had a negative month, with volumes decreasing by 32% and value traded falling by 7%. Morocco and Bahrain witnessed increases in both volume and value traded,...

Let us not miss the trees for the woods

Three questions predominate the narrative: Is the current fall in oil price cyclical or structural? When can we see a strong rebound? (2016 or 2017 or beyond) & Can GCC survive a long spell of low oil price? In fact, the second question is related to the first question. If the current fall in oil price is structural, then we cannot expect any strong rebound. So, may be implicitly we should pray that this is just a cyclical phenomenon. From...

Brent’s record rise sustains MENA momentum

Gulf markets have been gaining for the past couple of months, on the back of strong oil market performance, with the belief that the oil price movements have turned a corner. Investor focus has now shifted to the corporate earnings that are affected by the austerity measures, which were undertaken due to low oil prices. The TASI index performance was largely due to companies beating their first-quarter earnings estimates, as well as the surge in oil prices. The combined net...

Saudi Arabia and its US dollar peg dilemma

Most GCC countries are pegged to the US dollar to avoid currency fluctuation and eliminate uncertainties in international transactions (Kuwait is pegged to a basket of currencies dominated by the US dollar). This comes at the expense of monetary policy flexibility. Stable domestic currency and a fixed exchange rate imply that traders do not have to face currency risks, and therefore will be more willing to invest and facilitate trade. Since oil is the chief commodity in the GCC, and...

MENA Markets March on Oil Rise

Egypt’s stocks rose in March, as the country’s central bank devalued its currency and stated that it would adopt a more flexible exchange-rate policy, to ease an acute dollar shortage that is hurting the economy. The devaluation, along with other measures, made stocks cheaper for both domestic and foreign investors, who went on a purchasing binge. The exchange closed the month at 687 points, up from 560 points in February, in what has been the single largest monthly gain in...

Top GCC Risks for 2016 & Beyond

Oil: When will this slide end? With the oil price hovering around $35 per barrel the question remains as to how much longer can OPEC continue with its current policy of pumping as much oil as it can in a quest to win more market share and drive out high cost producers. OPEC member countries produce around 37% of the global crude oil, and disagreements over production ceilings have already affected some of the members. Some of the big producers,...

MENA Markets end 2015 in Red

  For the year 2015, Egypt declined 24%, due to faltering reforms and forex shortage, while Tadawul’s TASI index declined 17%. All MENA indices ended in red for the year 2015, with most witnessing double digit declines. Oil price fall, regional and global political developments, the recent Fed hike, and Eurozone woes were the much spoken themes for the year. S&P GCC declined 2.4% in December, making it a cumulative decline of 17.4% for 2015. MENA markets liquidity continued its...

The Paris Climate Agreement and Implications for the GCC

The Paris climate change deal will only come into force after it is placed for signatures of approval (from 22 April 2016 to 21 April 2017) by States and regional economic integration organizations that are Parties to the Convention (The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change). It is notable that the agreement can only come into force if it has received ratification by 55 countries that represent at least 55% of global emissions. For France that hosted the climate...