Manama: Mahmood Rafique, Editor: The Bahrain Bourse has reported gains for the third consecutive month during June-2021.
GCC Markets Monthly Report released by Kamco Invest said that the Bahrain All Share Index closed the month at 1,587.97 points after touching a 14-month high level on 29-Jun-2021 at 1,596.05 points, registering a gain of 4.0%, the biggest monthly gain in ten months.
The sector performance chart remained mixed during month with gains for Commercial Banks at 6.8% followed by Insurance and Investment indices with gains of 2.8% and 2.4%. These gains were partially offset by declines reported by Hotels and Tourism and Services index by 6.6% and 0.5%, respectively. In the Commercial Banking sector, four out of five banks reported gains during the month while shares of BISB remained flat.
AUB Bahrain reported the best monthly gain in the sector at 11.1% while rest of the banks witnessed only marginal gains. Shares of AUB have been on an upswing since the start of the month. The monthly gain further supported 1H-2021 performance and lifted the benchmark deeper into the green with a 1H-2021 gain of 6.6%. The Industrial index reported the highest returns in 1H-2021 at 24.8% followed by Insurance and Commercial Banks at 12.3% and 8.7%.
On the other hand, the Hotels and Tourism index reported the biggest decline of 12.8% followed by Services sector that declined by 3.2% during 1H-2021. The monthly gainers chart was topped by Khaleeji Commercial Bank with a gain of 34.0% that came after Shuaa Capital announced that it has sold its 3.8% stake in the bank to GFH.
Another fund managed by Shuaa Capital, Goldilocks Fund, also sold its 9.76% stake in the bank to GFH. With the acquisition of these stakes, GFH’s stake in Khaleeji Commercial Bank increased from 55.41% to 69.05%.
Other gainers on the exchange included Takaful International Co. with its shares up 15.5% followed by GFH Financial Group and AUB with gains of 12.0% and 11.1%, respectively. On the decliners’ side, Bahrain Cinema witnessed the biggest fall of 15.7% followed by Trafco and Nass Corp with declines of 5.1% and 4.4%, respectively. During the month, Investcorp announced that its plan to delist from the Bahrain Bourse and become a closed share company was approved by its shareholders at an EGM. The delisting is now subject to regulatory approvals and is expected to be completed during Q3-2021. The company also recently acquired CloudCare, an Italian tech-enabled digital sales and marketing solutions platform active in energy, telecom and insurance markets. On the other hand, reports said that Batelco is said to be planning to have its share dual listed on Saudi Exchange. It would be the first Bahraini company to have a dual listing in Saudi Arabia, but according to the report, the company has not made any decision yet.
Trading activity on the exchange remained upbeat with a sharp m-o-m increase during June-2021. Monthly volume of shares traded reached the highest in 30 months at 178.7million shares as compared to 51.0 million shares during May-2021. Monthly value traded reached a 3-month high level and almost doubled to BHD 22.1 million in June-2021 as compared to BHD 11.5 million during May-2021. Khaleeji Commercial Bank topped the monthly trades with BHD 9.1 million worth of shares traded during the month followed by AUB and GFH at BHD 5.5 million and BHD 3.4 million, respectively.
