The Impact of Announcing the Launch of an Islamic Index (DIX) on the performance of the Damascus Securities Exchange (DSE)

Abstract

Abstract

Market indicators attract the attention of administrations in financial markets, supervisory authorities, and investors because of their connection to investment decisions taken on the one hand, and because they express the state of the financial market on the other hand. The Damascus Securities Exchange (DSE) began its work on 3/10/2009, and the first main index for the market was issued on 1/4/2010, which includes all companies entering the market. Then a second index (leading stock index) was issued on 3/1/2019. It includes the most traded companies, and at the end of the last trading day in 2023, the market witnessed the announcement of the launch event of the Damascus Islamic Index DIX.

Although about fifteen years have passed since the opening of the market, the value of daily trading did not exceed one billion Syrian pounds (about $75,000) except in a few days, and the average size of investors who trade daily does not exceed 180 investors.

Therefore, the study aimed to demonstrate the impact of launching an Islamic index on the performance of the Damascus Securities Exchange in the short term. To achieve the objectives of the study, the descriptive approach was relied upon in studying previous literature related to financial markets and indicators. It also adopted the analytical approach through testing hypotheses and analyzing daily data on variables. The study was extracted from the Damascus Securities Exchange website during the period (9/11/2023 - 12/2/2024) based on Excel and the statistical program Spss v23.

The study found that there were no significant differences with statistical significance in the short term at the 5% significance level in the volume and value of trading in the Damascus Securities Exchange before and after the announcement of the launch of the Islamic Market Index during the study period. While the study showed that there were significant differences with statistical significance in the short term at a significance level of 5% in the market value of the Damascus Securities Exchange before and after the announcement of the launch of the Islamic Market Index during the study period. In addition, there are significant differences with statistical significance in the short term at a significance level of 5% in the volume of investors in the Damascus Securities Exchange before and after the announcement of the launch of the Islamic Market Index during the study period.