Shuaa suggests a flight to quality this month

The Head of Research and Chief Economist at Shuaa Capital, Dr Mahdi Mattar, explaining the top picks of the firm said:"We have chosen to reduce our defensive exposure in favour of higher beta plays with solid fundamentals." Dubai-based financial services firm has replaced the "highly defensive" Mobily with Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank (ADCB).

"UAE listings remain favourable to us and especially the Abu Dhabi names," said Dr Mattar. "On that note we decided to replace the highly defensive Mobily with ADCB, whose stock, we believe, has been overly punished since the global downturn," he said.

"Lastly, we also decided to remove Dana Gas from our portfolio this month as we do not see any catalyst driving the stock in the short term. Finally, we revisit our exposure to DP World this month after noticing a more positive sentiment on the stock post its first-half results."