Business | Markets
Dubai index ends in the red
Arabtec declines 3.31% to lead losers as investors book profits.
- By Gaurav Ghose, Financial Features Editor
- Published: 23:49 July 27, 2008
Dubai: Arabtec shares led a decline in Dubai shares on Sunday. Arabtec had a decent run last week before its second quarter results were announced on Friday.
The Dubai Financial Market General Index declined for the second straight day losing 0.55 per cent to close at 5,407.65. With foreign investors tending to be generally quiet on Sundays, the total volume fell by about 238 million shares. The turnover at Dh488.54 million was 64 per cent less than on Thursday.
Arabtec announced a second quarter net profit of Dh273.6 million, up by more than 140 per cent over the same period last year. However, it lost 3.31 per cent to close at Dh19.
"The reason why Arabtec got sold off was because it did so well last week, it was up about more than 11 per cent in the last four trading sessions - so you are always going to see a bit of a correction when people are taking profits on a stock that had a nice run like that," Anne Marie Browne, foreign institutional sales, Al Futtaim HC Securities.
Some of the other losers were Emaar, which declined 0.94 per cent to Dh10.50, Air Arabia, which closed 1.21 per cent down to Dh1.63, and Ajman Bank, which shed 1.80 per cent to Dh3.28.
The Abu Dhabi Securities Exchange Index closed 0.01 per cent down to 5,005.17. Volumes were low with a total turnover of Dh508.15 million, 50.6 per cent down from Thursday.
Sorouh Real Estate was down 0.42 per cent to Dh9.43. "It was the same with Sorouh - it was bought heavily on Thursday ahead of results so again people are booking profits on it," Browne said.
While Dana Gas lost 1.61 per cent to close at Dh1.83, Abu Dhabi national Energy remained flat at Dh2.98.
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