COVID-19 batters Qatar’s property sector
Qatar has been suffering from successive
crises one after another, i.e. the Arab boycott, which began in July 2017 due
to Doha’s wrong policies, and recently COVID-19, which has evidently impacted
the country’s economy.
The coronavirus has battered Qatar’s
property sector. The Qatari regime is keeping on spreading rumors among the
people. However, the official data about Qatar’s economy contradicts these
rumors.
In July 2017, the Arab quartet: Egypt,
Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain boycotted Qatar due to its
wrong policies, and its support to terrorism in a way that threatens stability in
these countries.
The Qatari Planning Ministry said
that real estate sales had declined by 16.9 percent on the period between November
2018 and November 2019, noting that sales had fallen by 30.9 percent monthly.
Qatar Central Bank said in a
statement released in March that the property sales in in Qatar declined, posting
the steepest fall since July 2014. The statement ascribed the decline in sales
to falling demand for real estate and investment on the back of weak business environment
in the country.
The statement said that the Qatari
real estate market scored 225.8 points, compared to 229.2 points in Q3 of 2019,
and 251 points in Q4 of 2018.
Consequently, the real estate sector
has negatively affected a number of other industrial sectors in Qatar. Most shares
of Qatari listed companies fell.
Qatar National Cement Company has
been affected by the decline. The company said in a bourse briefing that its 2019
net profit fell to 172 million riyals ($47.27 million), down from 348 million riyals
in 2018 ($95.65 million).
