Activity on the Lebanese stock market fell markedly during the seventh month of 2023 with volume traded decreasing by 35.09% month-on-month to 751,237 shares, compared to 1,157,356 shares in June and value traded dropping by 57.87% to $26.96 million, from just below $64 million a month earlier. Trades mainly consisted of banking sector (54.07% of total number of shares traded) stocks followed by real estate (45.75%) and industry & trading stocks (0.18%). The market capitalization of listed companies increased by 4.08% in July to around $18.40 billion and by 29.47% year-on-year when compared to the $14.21 billion reading reported in July 2022. The monthly rise in the market capitalization owes to the appreciation in the prices of heavy market capitalization-weighted stocks, namely Solidere “A” (3.49% monthly increase), Solidere “B” (6.67% monthly rise), Bank Audi listed shares (11.70% monthly increase), and BLOM Bank GDRs (11.11% monthly rally).

On an annual basis, the number of shares changing hands on the BSE nearly tripled when compared to the level reported in the first seven months of 2022 with the value of shares traded rising by 8.24% over the same period. As far as trading multiples are concerned, the weighted average Price to Book Value (P/BV) multiple of listed stocks ended the seventh month of 2023 higher at 6.258x from 5.985x in June, noting that it stood at 4.436x in July 2022 at a time when the prices of Solidere “A” and “B” shares were trading at $59.75 and $59.55 respectively, compared to closing prices of $80.10 for Solidere “A” shares and $80.00 for “Solidere “B” shares as at end of July 2023.

Overall, trading activity was thinner in July 2023 as evidenced by the drop in the turnover ratio (being the number of shares traded divided by total listed shares) to 0.04%, down from 0.06% a month earlier. Conversely, the turnover ratio increased to 1.51% during the first seven months of 2023 compared to 0.51% in the same period last year.