Stock markets in the Gulf rose on Tuesday after oil prices firmed above $36 a barrel, while Egyptian stocks slid in feeble volume as investors worried about a possible interest rate hike. The Saudi index advanced 1.5 percent to 6,181 points, breaking technical resistance at the early February and end-January peaks of 6,056-6,099 points. Chartists said this pointed to a rise towards 6,850.
Petrochemical stocks helped lift the bourse as Saudi Basic Industries added 1.7 percent and Saudi Kayan rose 2.0 percent in high volumes. Telecommunications also attracted considerable activity with Atheeb adding 2.4 percent and Mobily surging 6.7 percent after Bloomberg reported, citing unnamed sources, that Digital Bridge Holdings, which invests in communications industries, was among leading bidders for Mobily's portfolio of wireless towers in Saudi Arabia, a sale valued at $2 billion.
In a Reuters interview last November, Mobily said it was considering selling its mobile transmitter towers, most likely to a specialist tower company that would then lease these back to the seller. In February, Saudi's Maal financial news website said the kingdom's three telecommunications operators including Mobily were in talks to create a company to own and manage their mobile transmitter towers. For a second day, Dubai's Arabtec soared its daily limit; it jumped 14.6 percent to 1.65 dirhams with volume at another 6-1/2-year high. On Monday, exchange data showed former chief executive Hasan Ismaik had raised his stake to 11.91 percent from 11.81 percent.
In a brief statement on Tuesday, the company said there was no material news, technical or operational, to affect its share price. A source close to Ismaik told Reuters he was buying the shares because he saw future value in them, but details of his intentions remained unclear.
Many institutional investors are sceptical of the stock after its collapse from a record high of 7.37 dirhams, hit in May 2014. Of eight analysts covering it, three rate it "hold" and five "sell" or "strong sell", according to Thomson Reuters data; their median price target is 1.09 dirhams. But Arabtec helped lift Dubai's index 1.5 percent, with Union Properties adding 4.3 percent, its third straight day of gains.
Amlak Finance, a mid-sized Islamic investment house, jumped 9.4 percent, adding to a 12.8 percent gain made on the previous day when the company announced that annual net profit attributable to equity holders had surged 130 percent. In Abu Dhabi, the index added 0.5 percent, with most trade concentrated in small and mid-tier shares. Eshraq Properties, the most traded stock, rose 1.3 percent.
Most bluechip names, which are usually heavily traded, barely moved. The largest listed stock, Etisalat, added 0.6 percent and Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank rose 2.9 percent in modest volume ahead of its annual shareholders' meeting on Tuesday evening. Qatar's main benchmark added 0.8 percent in modest volume with Gulf International Services, the most traded stock, up 1.4 percent to 37.25 riyals. Last week, AlphaMena rated the stock a "buy" with a target of 73.60 riyals. But Cairo's index edged down 0.5 percent in its lowest volume since October 2015. Orascom Telecom, the most heavily traded stock, fell 3.4 percent.
Expectations that Egypt's interest rates will be hiked next month have increased. The Finance Ministry cancelled Monday's five-year treasury bond issue, while the average yield on the 10-year bond jumped more than 21 basis points. But Beltone Financial soared 9.9 percent after more than doubling over the last two weeks. The financial unit of Orascom Telecom this week signed a share purchase agreement to buy CI Capital, the investment banking arm of Commercial International Bank. CIB fell 1.9 percent.