Middle East Market Wrap 18 October: Six of Seven Markets Fall and Riyadh Alone Rises
Cairo’s EGX 30 fell 2.63 percent to 50,896.19 on Sunday, the steepest decline on a day when six of the seven Middle East markets that traded closed lower. Riyadh alone rose: the Tadawul All Share added 0.82 percent to 10,189.77 after two sessions of losses. Doha’s decline deepened to a third straight session, and the Central Bank of Egypt’s average market rate for the dollar edged to 53.4717 pounds buying, about 0.1 percent weaker for the pound than Thursday’s fixing, on our calculation.
Cairo Gives Back Two Sessions of Gains in One Afternoon
The EGX 30’s 2.63 percent fall was broad: 7 stocks rose against 206 that fell on the Egyptian Exchange’s own count, with 9 unchanged, so decliners outnumbered gainers by about 29 to one. The 1,377.15-point drop more than reversed the 1,008.07 points the index had gained across Wednesday and Thursday, against our published closes. The selling came alongside a softer official rate for the currency: the central bank’s average market series, dated today, put the dollar at 53.4717 pounds buying and 53.5717 selling, from 53.4134 and 53.5134 at Thursday’s fixing; against the 14 October fixing of 53.0544 buying, the pound is about 0.8 percent weaker, on our calculation, with most of that move arriving at Thursday’s fixing.
Doha Extends Its Slide While Riyadh Breaks Its Fall
The QE Index lost 2.00 percent to 8,633.57 on our arithmetic against Thursday’s close, a third straight decline, with Industries Qatar down 4.27 percent, Qatar Islamic Bank down 2.63 percent and QNB down 1.03 percent on the exchange’s ticker, and turnover of 321.1 million riyals. The Tadawul All Share moved the other way, up 0.82 percent at 10,189.77. Kuwait’s All-Share eased 0.40 percent to 8,442.06, a third straight decline, with the Premier Market down 0.24 percent against a 1.18 percent fall in the Main Market and 39.0 million dinars traded across 14,345 trades. The MSX 30 slipped 0.29 percent to 7,656.142 on even breadth of 20 rises against 20 falls, with 51.5 million rials traded. Bahrain’s All Share closed at 1,866.42, down 0.51 percent, and Amman’s ASE Index at 4,191.80, down 0.52 percent on our arithmetic, with 16 gainers against 54 losers in 10.7 million dinars of trade.
Gainers: Tadawul All Share (Saudi Arabia) 10,189.77, up 0.82 percent, the only rise.
Top losers
| Index | Close | Change |
|---|---|---|
| MSX 30 (Oman) | 7,656.142 | -0.29% |
| Boursa Kuwait All-Share (Kuwait) | 8,442.06 | -0.40% |
| Bahrain All Share (Bahrain) | 1,866.42 | -0.51% |
| ASE Index (Jordan) | 4,191.80 | -0.52% |
| QE Index (Qatar) | 8,633.57 | -2.00% |
| EGX 30 (Egypt) | 50,896.19 | -2.63% |
Closes of Sunday 18 October 2026 from the exchanges’ own pages, ranked against Thursday’s closes as published; the Doha and Amman changes are our arithmetic. Run lengths count against our published closes.
Official reference rates
| Rate | Level | Date |
|---|---|---|
| CBK US dollar/Kuwaiti dinar | 0.30795/05 | 18/10/2026, value 20/10 |
| CBE US dollar/Egyptian pound | 53.4717 / 53.5717 | 18/10/2026 |
The CBK row carries the central bank’s value date as printed on its main indicators page. The CBE row is the average market series on the bank’s statistics page.
United Arab Emirates, session of Friday 16 October
| Index | Close | Change |
|---|---|---|
| DFM General (Dubai) | 5,867.31 | +0.63% |
| FTSE ADX General (Abu Dhabi) | 9,808.37 | +0.04% |
Carried from our Asia Market Wrap of Friday 16 October 2026; the UAE trades on Friday and these are the region’s latest closes before Sunday’s session.
Asia, session of Friday 16 October
| Index | Close | Change |
|---|---|---|
| Kospi (South Korea) | 5,668.05 | +2.05% |
| Topix (Japan) | 4,066.00 | +1.67% |
| Nikkei 225 (Japan) | 65,324.29 | +1.39% |
| S&P/ASX 200 (Australia) | 8,806.70 | +1.00% |
| Nifty 50 (India) | 23,146.15 | +0.65% |
| Hang Seng (Hong Kong) | 24,186.83 | +0.52% |
| Taiex (Taiwan) | 47,111.26 | +0.30% |
| Shanghai Composite (China) | 3,716.28 | +0.24% |
| Straits Times (Singapore) | 5,415.53 | +0.22% |
| Shenzhen Component (China) | 11,802.46 | -0.12% |
Carried whole from our Asia Market Wrap of Friday 16 October 2026, that region’s last session before the Gulf week opened, gainers then the loser; the Nifty row is the exchange’s own figure.
Europe, session of Friday 16 October
| Index | Close | Change |
|---|---|---|
| DAX (Germany) | 25,622.61 | +0.95% |
| FTSE MIB (Italy) | 49,857.18 | +0.93% |
| AEX (Netherlands) | 1,142.88 | +0.91% |
| IBEX 35 (Spain) | 19,326.30 | +0.77% |
| STOXX Europe 600 (Europe) | 644.74 | +0.72% |
| Euro STOXX 50 (Euro area) | 6,204.23 | +0.58% |
| FTSE 100 (UK) | 10,881.90 | +0.38% |
| SMI (Switzerland) | 14,391.31 | +0.29% |
| CAC 40 (France) | 7,956.70 | +0.28% |
Carried whole from our Europe Market Wrap of Friday 16 October 2026, that region’s last session before the Gulf week opened, in its published order; all nine indices rose that session.
United States, session of Friday 16 October
| Index | Close | Change |
|---|---|---|
| Dow Jones Industrial Average | 52,002.41 | -0.34% |
| S&P 500 | 7,659.44 | -1.09% |
| Russell 2000 | 2,721.37 | -1.66% |
| Nasdaq Composite | 26,140.03 | -2.15% |
| Nasdaq 100 | 29,187.55 | -2.50% |
Carried whole from our US Market Wrap of Friday 16 October 2026, that region’s last session before the Gulf week opened; all five indices fell that session.
Why it matters: A session where one market rises and six fall, and where the deepest fall sits in Cairo beside a weaker official rate for the pound, reads less like a regional story than like several local ones arriving together: Egypt’s equity selloff landed in the same week its official dollar fixings stepped weaker, Doha is still working through the selling that began midweek, and Riyadh found buyers precisely where the rest of the Gulf did not. Of the seven indices we published today, the Tadawul All Share led at 0.82 percent and the EGX 30 lagged at minus 2.63 percent.
Outlook: All seven of today’s markets trade again on Monday, when Dubai and Abu Dhabi rejoin the region’s session after their Friday-Saturday weekend and the week’s first Asia and Europe sessions give the Gulf an external cue it did not have today. The central banks’ next dated fixings, Kuwait’s on Monday morning and Egypt’s with its next published update, will show whether today’s moves extend.
How these wraps are prepared: Methodology.
Sources: Boursa Kuwait, Saudi Exchange, Qatar Stock Exchange, Muscat Stock Exchange, Bahrain Bourse, Amman Stock Exchange, The Egyptian Exchange, Central Bank of Kuwait, Central Bank of Egypt, The Edge.
