The shares of 173 companies listed in the Saudi stock market ended their transactions of the past week on the upside with market index achieving positive gains amounting to 114 points, amid positive performance of most of the listed sectors.
Results also showed that shares of only 20 companies declined, and the shares of two companies settled at the same level for the previous week.
The Saudi companies listed in the local stock market are currently within the period to announce their financial results for the last quarter of 2019.
The companies that already announced their results during the past days revealed an improvement of an average of 22 percent, compared to the total results of the same companies during the last quarter of 2018.
The Saudi stock market index ended the trading of the last week, up 1.4 percent, equivalent to 114 points, closing at 8460 points, compared to the previous week’s closing at 8346 points.
Last week, Saudi companies began announcing their financial results for Q4 of 2019, while Advanced Petrochemicals was the first to to make an announcement, other companies are expected to follow during the determined period for annual results, scheduled to end on March 31.
Total trading during the past week's transactions increased slightly, reaching about $5.51 billion, compared to about $5.5 billion a week earlier.
In this regard, all sectors of the market saw a jump during last week's transactions except for the energy and TSSI sectors, which decreased by about 1 percent.
The media and entertainment sector topped the list of high sectors by 7.2 percent.
At closure last Thursday, the market value of Saudi shares jumped to $2.36 trillion, while the price-earnings ratio stabilized at 20, an attractive level for investors wishing to boost their investments in many of the shares of listed companies.
Saudi market will start trading Sunday on a positive note, at a time when US stock indices rose during Friday's trading to new levels, to achieve gains in a week that witnessed the signing of the first stage of the trade agreement between Washington and Beijing.
Financial and technical analyst, Faisal al-Oqab confirmed that the market index will seek during the next week’s trades to cross the 8500 point barrier, saying it may stabilize over that barrier if there is a positive movement from Aramco shares and some bank stocks.
Net profits of Saudi companies listed in the Saudi market, excluding Saudi Aramco, during the first nine months of 2019 amounted to about $ 17.2 billion, while profits during Q4 of last year are expected to witness an unprecedented jump, driven by the profits that Saudi Aramco which are expected to be announced.
