European Market Ended Higher Despite ECB Interest Rate Hike

This week, the BLOM Stock Index (BSI) compiled by BLOMInvest Bank on a daily basis recorded an increase of 2.41% to reach 1,297.922 on October 28, 2022. The market capitalization on the Beirut Stock Exchange (BSE) expanded weekly from $12.98B to $13.30B. The average volume and value of trades also totaled 414,562 shares worth $3,256,454 compared to 26,958 shares worth $902,890 last week.

On the Beirut Stock Exchange (BSE), the real estate sector grasped the lion’s share of the BSE’s trading value with a stake of 92.61%, while the banking sector and the industrial sector grasped the remaining of 6.69% and 0.70%, respectively. The most noteworthy trades throughout the mentioned period included:

• Solidere (A) shares increased by 2.59% to settle at $53.55/share
• Solidere (B) shares expanded by 3.23% to settle at $54.35/share
• BLOM Listed retreated by 1.32% to settle at $3/share
• Audi GDR dropped by 6.04% to settle at $1.40/share
• Byblos Listed shares added 1.75% to settle at $0.58/share
• Holcim Liban jumped 9.98% to settle at $32.84/share
• Ciments Blanc N jumped 5.88% to settle at $9/share

As for the BLOM Preferred Shares Index (BPSI), it remained unchanged at 41.02 by October 28, 2022.

In the Arab region, major Arab bourses recorded a worst performance this week. The S&P Pan Arab index and the MSCI index both decreased by 1.41% and 0.61%, respectively, compared to last week. Moreover, Bourse of Egypt and Tunisia added 7.77%, 1.05%, respectively, by the end of this week. Meanwhile, the bourse of Qatar, Saudi Arabia, UAE, and Kuwait recorded a downtick of 3.12%, 2.12%, 1.45%, and 0.34% by the end of this week.

In the US market, major indexes in the Wall Street re-picked by the end of this week driven by positive GDP in the U.S. The equity market generally moves inversely to the bond yields as lower bond yields indicate lower risks on the horizon. As such, the S&P 500 increased by 3.86% on a weekly basis to stand at 3,807.30 by Friday 28, October 2022, while NASDAQ index followed the same trend and added 1.68% to reach 10,792.68 for the same period.

In Europe, equity market posted a positive record by the end of week 28, October 2022 to hit a five-week high despite a 75-bps interest rate hike by the ECB on Thursday. As such, DAX index and CAC 40 registered an uptick of 4.17% and 4%, respectively, to stand at 13,127.03 and 6,230.72 by October 28, 2022, up from last week 12,600.98 and 5,991.07. In the same token, the FTSE 100 plummeted by 2.18% from 6,892.47 to 7,042.65 by Friday after the selection of new Prime Minister Rishi Sunak. As for Japan, NIKKEI index recorded a weekly slight uptick of 0.80% to end up the week at 27,105.20.