RIYADH: The ownership of qualified foreign investors in Saudi Arabia’s stock market surged to SR284 billion ($76 billion) by the end of the second quarter of 2022. This is 31 percent up from SR216 billion in the same period last year, according to a report by the Capital Market Authority. “Qualified foreign investors are playing an increasingly significant role on the Saudi exchange,” said an earlier CMA report. Foreign investors’ ownership in Saudi-listed stocks touched the highest level of SR340 billion in April 2022. When it comes to total foreign investment by swap holders, foreign residents, QFIs, foreign diversified portfolio managers, and foreign strategic investors, the ownership rose to SR354 billion at the end of the second quarter from SR276 billion a year ago. Overall institutional investors held 96.6 percent of the total ownership in the market of SR11.4 trillion, while the remaining 3.34 percent belonged to non-institutional investors at the end of the three-month period. In the same period of 2021, the breakdown of institutional and non-institutional investors was 95.9 percent for the former and 4.05 percent for the latter out of SR9.7 trillion in total.