Middle East Bank Tracks Q3 Stock Market Trends

Tehran Stock Exchange’s overall index closed the third quarter of the current Iranian year (Sept. 23-Dec. 21, 2017) at 95,510, indicating an 11.3% rise from the beginning of that season and 23.3% from the beginning of the year, according to the Middle East Bank’s latest quarterly report.

The total value of TSE transactions in Q3 amounted to 134.5 trillion rials (about $2.9 billion), including debt securities worth 19.9 trillion rials ($428 million).

The over-the-counter market Iran Fara Bourse’s index closed Q3 at 1,082, showing a 13% rise from the beginning of that quarter and 22.9% rise from the beginning of the year.

The total value of OTC transactions amounted to 161.1 trillion rials ($3.4 billion), exceeding TSE’s, out of which 105.3 trillion ($2.2 billion) belonged to various types of debt securities, including Islamic Treasury Bills, participation bonds, Murabaha and mortgages.

The seventh  batch of “banking” ITBs valued at 35 trillion rials ($753 million), issued at the end of the last fiscal year and admitted in the late Q2 of this year, became tradable at IFB in early fall and will mature at the end of the next fiscal year. These bills, which had to be previously traded directly between the buyer and the seller in selected branches of Melli Bank, became tradable at the OTC market and are not referred to as “banking” bills anymore.

After ceasing the issuance of ITBs late last year, another series of these bills amounting to 28 trillion ($602 million) were issued in the sixth and eighth months of the current year by the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Finance. These two series with one-year maturity were admitted at OTC market in the middle of fall and their tickers opened in the last days of that season.

Four-year Murabaha bills with six-month interest payments at the rate of 17% aimed at financing medical equipment purchases valued at 20 trillion rials ($430 million) and issued in fall by the same ministry were admitted to IFB at the end of fall.