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UAE indexes lead global rally as spread of Covid-19 slows

Led by the UAE, stock markets rallied across the GCC, Asia, Europe and the US on Tuesday on recovery in oil prices and hopes of coronavirus spread slowing in different countries.
The Dubai Financial Market jumped 5.54 per cent to 1,785 points, led by 14.78 per cent jump in Emirates NBD, 13 per cent gain in Emaar Development, 11.7 per cent surge in DFM shares and 10 per cent increase in Union Properties shares.
The Abu Dhabi index also extended gains by 5.5 per cent as the banking and energy scrips staged a strong rebound. Methaq gained 14.8 per cent, First Abu Dhabi Bank jumped 12 per cent, Abu Dhabi Ship Building rose 10 per cent and Taqa was up 8.34 per cent.
The Qatari index ended up 3.1 per cent, with 19 of 20 stocks on the index trading higher. The Saudi Arabia's benchmark index advanced 1.8 per cent, led by gains in National Commercial Bank, Al Rajhi Bank and others. Saudi Aramco edged up 0.2 per cent to 32 riyals, hitting its IPO price.
The Bahrain market edged up 0.2 per cent to 1,313 points, The Boursa Kuwait was up 0.4 per cent to 5,094 points and Oman slipped 0.1 per cent to 3,398 points. The Egypt's blue-chip index jumped 4.2 per cent, with Commercial International Bank rising 6.8 per cent and EFG Hermes gaining 10 per cent.

Global rally
Markets in other parts of the world gained on hopes that the peak of Covid-19 surge is near in places like the US and Europe. China on Tuesday reported no new deaths from the coronarivus over the past 24 hours. It had 32 new cases, all from people who returned from overseas.
Wall Street stocks opened higher Tuesday, surging for a second straight session amid hopes governments are making progress in combatting the spread of the coronavirus.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average stood at 23,380.75, up 700 points or 3.1 per cent. The broad-based S&P 500 jumped 2.7 per cent to 2,735.25, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index gained 2.2 per cent to 8,084.82 in 15 minutes after the opening of the trade.
"It is gleeful that we could be nearing the worst of the coronavirus from a health standpoint. But he cautioned that sentiment might be "too far ahead of itself with an assumption that things will go back to normal when the stay-at-home orders are lifted," said Patrick O'Hare, analyst at Briefing.com.
In Asia, South Korea's Kospi gained 1.8 per cent to 1,823.60. Hong Kong's Hang Seng added 2.1 per cent to 24,253.29, while the Shanghai Composite jumped nearly 2.1 per cent to 2,820.76. But Australia's S&P/ASX 200 lost 0.7 per cent to 5,252.30.
Japan's benchmark Nikkei 225 gained two per cent to finish at 18,950.18 ahead of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's announcement of a state of emergency in Tokyo and six other regions.
Pakistan Stock Exchange also gained 2.1 per cent to close at 31,231 points.
In Europe, France's CAC 40 stock index was up nearly 3.06 per cent to 4,479, while Germany's DAX jumped 3.91 per cent to 10,469. Britain's FTSE 100 added 3.3 per cent to 5,766 on Tuesday evening. - waheedabbas@khaleejtimes.com