It was a good time for the stocks of Shariah-principled lenders on the Doha stock Exchange this week. A large and mid cap equities shown robust performance taking the 20-stock benchmark upward by 2.15 per cent or 189 points during the reporting period. The benchmark stood at 8,949.76 points in the week making the QE to become the second best performer among the all Gulf bourses.

The bourses of Abu Dhabi, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Dubai and Muscat also showed upward performance by reporting an increase of 2.48%, 1.75%, and 1.51%, 1.10% and 0.85% respectively. Things, however, remained tough for Kuwait as its benchmark fell 0.53 per cent on accounts of poor response of foreign institutional investors.

Amjad Hussain, partner at international law firm Eversheds, said, "Last year, the QCB issued a ruling asking Islamic windows of conventional banks to restrict their lending."

Many of the conventional banks were affected by the recent ruling of QCB but actual picture will take some time to get clear.