Dubai: The UAE’s main equity indices continued to move sideways on Monday as trade values remained lacklustre with no strong catalysts to drive market performance.
The Dubai Financial Market (DFM) index inched up 0.29 per cent to reach 3,613.06, with just Dh156.2 million traded in the market all day. GFH Financial Group topped the market as the most actively traded stock in terms of value, accounting for 25 per cent of the total traded value.
“There’s not much news in the market to dictate any specific direction. However, the recent upgrade by Moody’s on Dubai Islamic Bank has given a positive boost to stock, which is up 1.3 per cent. As a stock, it’s [DIB] trading at very attractive multiples, and giving a yield of 7.4 per cent at this price,” said Tariq Qaqish, managing director of asset management at Menacorp.
On Sunday, Moody’s upgraded DIB’s local and foreign currency long-term issuer ratings to A3 from Baa1, and upgraded the bank’s baseline credit assessment to Ba2 from Ba3. Moody’s said the upgrade was driven by the bank’s significant improvement in asset quality and provisioning coverage.
Elsewhere on the Dubai bourse, GFH share prices ended 1.12 per cent lower to reach Dh1.76, as Arabtec fell 0.93. Union Properties gained 0.33 per cent, Tabreed rose 0.48 per cent, and Emaar remained flat.
“Going forward, I think valuations will definitely be something that will attract investors. We’ve also seen companies going through restructuring, and you’ll see more project awards for the Expo 2020, so it’s going to be local news driving markets,” Qaqish said.
He added that from a valuations perspective, bank stocks, mainly those of the big banks, were attractive.
Meanwhile, the Abu Dhabi Securities Exchange (ADX) general index inched up 0.11 per cent to reach 4,485.01. Trade on the Abu Dhabi bourse continued to be concentrated on the blue chips including etisalat, First Abu Dhabi Bank, Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank, and Aldar Properties.
Across the UAE’s borders, Saudi Arabia’s Tadawul index gained 0.51 per cent to reach 7,261.84, as Kuwait’s main index remained almost flat, dropping 0.08 per cent to end at 6,908.
