Tadawul Review:

Tadawul All Share Index (TASI) ended today’s session with an increase of 83 points (+0.6%) to close at 13,165 levels, a new closing record. TASI has added 1,883 points (+16.7%) since the beginning of the year. Today, the market opened in the green zone and then a few hours later declined and reached its intra-day low of -26 points. However, it managed to reverse its direction to rise by 108 points from its intra-day low. The Banking sector led the rally as it rose by +0.8%, while the Materials sector recorded a rise of +0.4% with AMAK ending the session +9.9% higher. Energy also advanced by +0.2%. Other stocks that were significantly up were ACWA POWER (+10%), ELM (+8.3%) and TADAWUL GROUP (+5.2%). Trading volumes and values significantly rebounded after falling sharply yesterday, rising by +56% and +73% respectively to reach 183mn shares and 9bn in liquidity.

Market Wrap International:

On Monday, U.S. equities rose, led by technology stocks, after Elon Musk purchased a +9.2% stake in Twitter Inc, pushing the stock up +26.2%. Only 49.5% of stocks rose in the S&P500, with gains concentrated in technology (+1.9%), consumer discretionary (+2.3%), and communications (+2.3%), while most other sectors declined somewhat. The Nasdaq Composite increased by +1.9%, while the Dow Jones was up by +0.3% and the Russell 2000 increased by +0.2%. Twitter's stock soared after it was reported that Elon Musk had bought a +9.2% passive investment in the firm, with some analysts speculating that the stake could turn active and be used to advocate for changes to Twitter's content policies. Tesla Inc.'s stock gained +4.8% after the company reported record deliveries over the weekend.

Despite the possibility of more penalties against Russia, European stocks rose on Monday as Ukraine accused Russia of war crimes during video talks that resumed on Monday. Consumer discretionary gained +2.2%, health care gained +1.3%, and technology gained +1.9%, boosting the Euro Stoxx 600 by +0.8%. With major indices across the region up, the DAX gained +0.5% percent, the CAC +0.7%, and the FTSE100 +0.3%. This month, when corporations begin to report Q1 profits, the focus will shift to earnings, which are predicted to increase by 3.5% to 8.3%.

In Asia, all major indices closed in the green zone on Monday, meanwhile, more sanctions are expected to be placed on Russia. In China, SHCOMP was closed for vacation on Monday and will reopen on Wednesday. In Hong Kong, after closing flat on Thursday, Hang Seng surged in the week's first session, adding +2.1% led by Tech firms. In Japan, although Nikkei 225 was mostly negative in the morning session, it managed to rise in the afternoon and closed +0.3% higher. In South Korea, KOSPI rose by +0.7%, offsetting the previous session loss. In India, SENSEX closed positive by +2.0%.