Oil gains offer some comfort to investors

Shares performed brightly across the Arabian Gulf, as overnight oil price gains proved of comfort for retail investors.

Brent crude futures hit a new high for the year of US$53.14 per barrel on Monday, after Saudi Arabia and Russia said they were ready to cooperate to curb output.

Brent trended slightly lower yesterday afternoon, trading at about $52.90 per barrel.

Saudi Arabia’s Tadawul rose strongly on the deal, closing up 1.4 per cent at 5655.61. All bourses across the Arabian Gulf region, with the exception of Abu Dhabi, ended in positive territory.

The Dubai Financial Market General Index closed up 0.9 per cent at 3,390.56, with just one stock closing in the red.

“The uptick was largely attributable to retail buyers investing in mid-cap names, driven by the positive economic picture elsewhere and particularly assisted by uptick in oil prices,” said Julian Bruce, the head of institutional trading at EFG-Hermes in Dubai.

“Blips like this are usually short-lived. There’s growing enthusiasm that a grand deal will be struck on production levels, but until that happens we’ll continue to see low volume speculation causing moves in the market.”

DXB Entertainment was the pick of big-name gainers in Dubai, with the theme park owner’s shares surging by 4 per cent to finish at Dh1.54 apiece. Emaar Properties, DIB and Emaar Malls all gained.

The Abu Dhabi Securities Exchange General Index closed 0.3 per cent down at 4,373.88, even as more shares finished higher than lower. FGB and NBAD acted as the main drag on the index, closing 1.7 per cent and 0.6 per cent lower.