Random profit-collecting sales drive Kuwait Stock Exchange indices down

Kuwait Stock Exchange (KSE) ended last week in the red zone driven by a strong and random sale-for-profit trend, a specialized economic report showed Saturday.
The report, issued by Bayan Investment Company, showed that the Price Index closed at 6,572.26 points, down by 1.36 percent from the week before closing, the Weighted Index decreased by 0.84 percent after closing at 441.84 points, whereas the KSX-15 Index closed 1,072.70 points down by 0.89 percent.
Furthermore, last week's average daily turnover decreased by 27.92 percent, compared to the preceding week, reaching K.D 25.05 million, whereas trading volume average was 256.39 million shares, recording a decrease of 34.72 percent.
"The stock market indicators grouped to close in the red zone, as the market was subject to a strong sale for profit trend, concentrated on stocks of previous gains in prior weeks, of both large-cap and small-cap, which limited the market gains that were realized at the beginning of this year to a great extent," reads the report.
"Also, the market cap losses during last week reached KD 183.48 million, down by 0.65 percent, to record KD 28.21 billion by the end of the week, compared to KD 28.39 billion in the preceding week." Bayan also explained that the stock market initiated the first session of the week with limited losses for its three indices, affected by the profit collection operations executed on many traded stocks during the session, among a noticeable decrease in the traded liquidity, which dropped more than 20 percent.
It added that the market continued its losses in the second session, which witnessed a greater drop in the market indices, due to the increased random selling operations that a large part of the traders executed after few listed companies' disclosure for the optional delisting from Kuwait Stock Exchange, which spread a state of pessimism among the investment arena in the market, amid fears of other companies' decisions to exit the KSE.
"However on Wednesday's session, the stock market was able to realize good gains for the three indices, compensating by this a part of its losses earlier in the week, whereas it received support from the random purchasing operations that included many stocks, and concentrated on the large-cap ones, among a noticeable increased cash liquidity, although did not last long, as the market returned to record losses once again in the next session, which witnessed a decline in the three indices affected by the random selling operations that concentrated on the small-cap stocks in the Real Estate and Financial Services sectors in particular," noted that the report.
For the annual performance, Bayan data showed that the price index ended last week recording 0.56 percent annual gain compared to its closing in 2014, while the weighted index increased by 0.67 percent, and the KSX-15 recorded 1.20 percent growth.