Wednesday, 08 July 2015 17:21
DUBAI: The bear run on Egypt’s stock market continued early on Wednesday as property developer Emaar Misr slid further in the wake of its listing, while weak oil prices weighed on Saudi Arabia.
The Egyptian stock index sank 1.8 percent to 7,615 points, bringing its losses from February’s multi-year peak to 24 percent.
The market has been hit by economic worries, such as energy and foreign exchange shortages, and security fears after clashes with militants in the Sinai and the assassination of a senior official in Cairo.
The Greek crisis has also hurt since the euro zone is a top trading partner and source of tourists for Egypt.
Emaar Misr, which listed on Sunday after an initial public offer at 3.80 Egyptian pounds per share, slid a further 4.9 percent to 3.30 pounds. Before the IPO, analysts had put fair value at around 4.70 pounds, suggesting there was now panic selling of the stock.
Palm Hills Development, another big real estate firm, dropped 2.4 percent early on Wednesday.
Arab Cotton Ginning, which dropped 2.5 percent on Monday after the government said it was halting all cotton imports in a bid to assist production and marketing of the local crop, fell a further 2.2 percent. The chairman of the Egyptian Chamber of Textile Industries said the textiles sector would be hurt by the lack of cheap cotton imports.
Meanwhile, the Saudi stock index slipped 0.5 percent as Saudi Basic Industries, a petrochemical blue chip which is sensitive to oil prices, lost 1.1 percent. Samba Financial Group, the third-largest bank by assets, fell 0.7 percent after its board recommended a 0.45 riyal per share dividend for the first half of 2015.
That was lower than the 0.65 riyal which the bank said it would pay for the corresponding period of 2014.
