By: Mohamed Farouk

Mubasher: The indices of Boursa Kuwait witnessed a significant decline in its first 2020 trading session on Sunday amid increasing political tensions in the region, due to the US-Iran conflict.

The All-Share Index decreased by 3.72% or 234 points to 6,048.64 points, hitting its lowest level in a month.

The Premier Market index plunged by 4% or 283.9 points to close at 6,692.08 points, while the Main Market index declined by 2.7% or 131.8 points to 4,778.93 points.

On Sunday, Boursa Kuwait saw the largest trading activity for the first time in four months through 258 million shares traded through 11,216 transactions at KWD 71 million worth of liquidity.

As for the sectors, the telecommunication led nine decliners with 5.36%, followed by the industrial segment with 4.33% and the banks with 3.74%, while the insurance was the only gainer with 0.17%.

Meanwhile, the Energy House Holding topped the red zone with 18.42%, while Tijara and Real Estate Investment came on top of the green zone with 10%.

Kuwait Finance House (KFH), which registered a 5.06% decrease by the end of the session, recorded the highest trading volume of 24.03 million shares through 1,358 transactions at a value of KWD 18.68 million.

Commenting on today’s negative performance, capital market analyst, Dawoud Abdel Ghani, said that Sunday’s significant retreat in the Gulf markets is normal due to the accelerating geopolitical incidents witnessed in the recent period after the US had killed Soleimani in a raid on Iraqi territory.

He added that Boursa Kuwait usually becomes the most affected market in the Gulf by any political or economic incidents.

He further remarked that Boursa Kuwait registered a great decline in the banks sector, except for Tijara which closed unchanged.