Then, SAMA Governor delivered a speech on the occasion in which he said that during 2017, the national economy witnessed a number of positive indicators despite the contraction of GDP by about 0.86%, as a result of the decline of the GDP of the oil sector by 3.09%, however, the GDP of the non-oil sector registered a positive growth of 1.05 percent and that the average consumer price index fell by 0.9 percent in 2017 compared with a rise of 2.0 percent in 2016. He further says that among the positive indicators witnessed by the national economy is the remarkable improvement in the Kingdom's current account of the balance of payments, which recorded a surplus of 57.1 billion riyals in 2017 against a deficit of 89.4 billion riyals in 2016 and concerning the stock market, the Saudi Stock Exchange (Tadawul) has recently joined a number of global market Indexes such as Morgan Stanley, Standard & Poor's (S & P) and FTSE Index for emerging markets and it is expected that this contributes to enhancing the efficiency of the financial market and increasing market attractiveness for Saudi and foreign investors. --More 13:18 LOCAL TIME 10:18 GMT 0007 www.spa.gov.sa/w744194