In Shahrivar, Tehran's Large Caps Pulled Ahead of the Small Ones: Headline Index 24.5 Percent, Equal-Weight Index 16.5 Percent, an 8 Point Gap in Iran Market Pulse for Saturday, September 19, 2026

1. Lead

Shahrivar was a good month for the Tehran Stock Exchange, but not equally good for everyone. In our own recorded series, from the close of Sunday 1 Shahrivar 1405 (23 August 2026) to the close of Wednesday 25 Shahrivar (16 September 2026), the headline index (TEDPIX) rose 24.5 percent and the equal-weight index rose 16.5 percent. Subtracting one from the other gives a gap of 8 percentage points. The headline index is weighted by market capitalisation, so the largest companies drive it; the equal-weight index counts every symbol once, which is why it represents small and mid caps. Those 8 points mean that the month recorded in the headlines was not recorded to the same degree in the average retail portfolio.

Both ends of the calculation are explicit and both come from one series and one source: the headline index stood at 6,069,888 points on 1 Shahrivar and 7,557,642 points on 25 Shahrivar; the equal-weight index stood at 1,730,272 points on 1 Shahrivar and 2,016,173 points on 25 Shahrivar. Over the same window the ratio of the headline index to the equal-weight index moved from 3.51 to 3.75. Donya-e-Eqtesad independently reports the same ratio, putting it at about 3.5 at the start of Shahrivar and about 3.75 now (Donya-e-Eqtesad, Friday 27 Shahrivar / 18 September 2026).

One important caveat completes the picture: this lead belongs to Shahrivar, not to the year. According to Donya-e-Eqtesad, the year-to-date return is 103 percent for the headline index and 112 percent for the equal-weight index, so on a full-year scale the small caps are still 9 percentage points ahead. What happened in Shahrivar is a reversal in the direction of that lead, not its beginning (Saturday 28 Shahrivar 1405 / 19 September 2026).

2. Today's Snapshot

3. Today's Key Headlines

• Retail equity turnover in the Wednesday 25 Shahrivar session set a fresh all-time record at 687 trillion rials, and retail investors brought in roughly 23 trillion rials of net money (Donya-e-Eqtesad, 25 and 27 Shahrivar; Boursenews, 28 Shahrivar).
• The Federal Reserve raised its policy rate by 0.25 percentage points, the first increase since 2023. Spot gold stands at 4,383.45 dollars this morning after that decision (Saturday 28 Shahrivar, 00:51).
• The Bank of Japan raised its rate to 1.25 percent, the highest in 31 years, and the Bank of England held at 3.75 percent for a second consecutive meeting while warning of upside inflation risk (Al Jazeera and the Bank of England, 27 Shahrivar / 18 September 2026).
• The Istanbul exchange fell sharply on Wednesday: the BIST 100 closed down 5.54 percent, the banking index lost more than 8.5 percent, the IPO index more than 9 percent, and over 60 stocks hit their lowest price levels (Donya-e-Eqtesad citing Ekonomi Gazetesi, 28 Shahrivar).
• Oil fell for a third consecutive session as Saudi Arabia moved to restore flow through its east to west pipeline. Tanker traffic through the Strait of Hormuz fell to just four vessels (Energy Connects via Bloomberg and OilPrice, 27 Shahrivar).
• The Central Bank of Iran put the 1404 trade surplus at 26.3 billion dollars in its latest economic indicators, with the short-term share of external debt at 64.6 percent (EcoIran citing Central Bank of Iran economic indicators, 27 Shahrivar).

4. Currency

The banknote market closed last week lower. The free-market dollar was recorded at 2,279,000 rials in the last reading of Thursday 26 Shahrivar at 16:59. Against the Tuesday 24 Shahrivar close of 2,303,950 rials, that is 24,950 rials and 1.08 percent lower in two days. Donya-e-Eqtesad also noted in its weekly wrap that the dollar and gold failed to post a positive return that week, while the bourse recorded its eighth consecutive green week (27 Shahrivar).

The two-rate gap widened again. The remittance dollar sell rate at the Iran Currency and Gold Exchange Center was recorded at 1,658,791 rials on Thursday 26 Shahrivar at 08:32, with the buy rate at 1,643,862 rials. The gap between the free rate and the remittance rate is therefore 620,209 rials, meaning the free rate sits 37.4 percent above the administrative one. The mechanism of this gap is definitional and needs no added assumption: the free rate comes from supply and demand in the banknote market, and the remittance rate from administrative allocation for imports and designated uses. One divergence in accounts should be stated plainly: in the same report Donya-e-Eqtesad describes the gap between the agreed (tavafoqi) rate and the free rate as about 30 percent; our 37.4 percent figure is the ratio of the free rate to the Exchange Center remittance rate, and these are two different reference rates.

The UAE dirham, the effective rate for a large share of Iran's imports routed through Dubai, closed Thursday at 623,550 rials, 7,150 rials and 1.13 percent below the 24 Shahrivar close; the Exchange Center remittance rate for the dirham is 451,679 rials. In global currency markets, the euro stands at 1.1485 against the dollar, sterling at 1.3394, and the dollar at 156.88 yen (Saturday 28 Shahrivar, 00:59).

5. Gold and Coin

Unlike the dollar, the domestic gold market closed the week higher. 18 karat gold was recorded at 23,363,000 rials per gram on Thursday 26 Shahrivar, 1,039,000 rials above the 24 Shahrivar close; the gold mesghal at 101,198,000 rials, 4,500,000 rials higher; and the Emami coin at 231,985,000 rials, 5,000,000 rials higher. This morning 18 karat trading gold opened 70,000 rials higher at 23,288,100 rials (Saturday 28 Shahrivar, 07:44).

The share that is not gold got thicker. The Emami coin premium was recorded at 2,346,000 rials on Thursday, equal to 1.01 percent of the coin price. In our Tuesday report the same premium was 1,695,000 rials and 0.73 percent, so it has widened by 651,000 rials in two days. The premium is by definition the distance between the coin's market price and the value of the metal struck into it, and its thickening means today's buyer pays more for the coin being a coin than two days ago. For comparison, the Bahar Azadi coin premium is 6,246,000 rials and the quarter coin premium 4,429,000 rials (same reading).

The external driver is clear and dated. Spot gold stands at 4,383.45 dollars this morning after the Federal Reserve raised its rate by 0.25 percentage points. The rial price of gold is by definition the product of the global ounce and the dollar rate, and over this window the ounce rose while the free-market dollar fell 1.08 percent; the two drivers worked against each other, and what reached the domestic gram was their net effect. On the exchange board, gold funds closed green in the 25 Shahrivar session: the Gold fund 1.34 percent higher at 1,619,668 rials and Jam-e Tala 1.42 percent higher at 20,846 rials.

6. Bourse and Farabourse

The Tehran Stock Exchange and the Farabourse are two separate markets with two separate indices, and the Wednesday 25 Shahrivar session showed that difference well. The headline index rose 35,679 points, or 0.47 percent, to close at 7,557,642. The equal-weight index in the same session fell 1,322 points, or 0.07 percent, to close at 2,016,173. The Farabourse headline index, a separate index on a separate market, was effectively flat, easing 1.73 points to 58,193. Donya-e-Eqtesad independently reports the same two bourse figures: a 0.47 percent gain for the headline index and a 0.07 percent fall for the equal-weight index (25 and 27 Shahrivar).

This is the same 8 points today's headline is about, on a single-session scale. Three numbers close the Shahrivar story. First, the monthly return: 24.5 percent for the headline index against 16.5 percent for the equal-weight. Second, the ratio of the two indices, which moved from 3.51 to 3.75. Third, the direction of that lead on a full-year scale, which is still the other way around, because the year-to-date return is reported at 103 percent for the headline index and 112 percent for the equal-weight. Together these mean the small caps were ahead this year and fell behind in Shahrivar. On the why, caution is required: Donya-e-Eqtesad links this to the rising exchange rate and its effect on profit expectations for large, export-oriented companies, and that is a published analysis rather than something this data proves.

The record of the day, though, was elsewhere. Retail equity turnover in that same 25 Shahrivar session reached 687 trillion rials, an all-time record, with net retail inflow of roughly 23 trillion rials. In our own recorded data, total turnover on the Tehran board was 607,359 billion rials across 1,462,263 trades and the Farabourse 893,446 billion rials across 747,789 trades. That the Farabourse outgrew the bourse is explained by a single symbol: Akhza 2104, a government debt instrument, alone turned over 148,539 billion rials, or 16.6 percent of the Farabourse's entire turnover that day. The next five most-traded Farabourse symbols were all government debt paper as well.

The board, symbol by symbol. In our board-events data, Mobarakeh Steel rose 2.98 percent in the 25 Shahrivar session to close at 3,319 rials, recorded its ninth consecutive higher close, reached its highest closing price since 22 Dey 1404 (12 January 2026), and traded 2.49 times its twenty-session average volume; 25.4 percent of its buying was net retail, and a buy queue of 115,088,897 shares stood at that price. National Iranian Copper rose 1.29 percent and reached its highest level in a year at 27,060 rials. Ahrom recorded its tenth consecutive higher close and touched a one-year high of 75,064 rials, and Bank Mellat also reached a one-year high at 1,593 rials. On the other side, Isfahan Oil Refining faced a sell queue of 49,050,601 shares at 13,750 rials, and Pzaz on the Farabourse fell 2.13 percent while trading 4.28 times its twenty-session average volume. The Base Market, the shallower tier inside the Farabourse with wider price bands and far more frequent halts, recorded no notable event in our data.

7. Crypto

The largest move of the past three days came from the crypto market. Both ends of the calculation come from one series and one source: bitcoin stood at 75,884 dollars in the Wednesday 25 Shahrivar reading at 07:43 and at 81,208 dollars in the Saturday 28 Shahrivar reading at 07:44, which is 5,324 dollars and 7.02 percent higher. CoinDesk reported the same turn, writing that as jitters over a Federal Reserve rate increase faded, bitcoin topped 80,700 dollars, with layer two and DeFi tokens leading the advance (CoinDesk, 27 Shahrivar). Bitcoin Cash moved the other way, down 1.96 percent at 248.99 dollars, and Tether Gold at 4,376.9 dollars is effectively level with spot gold.

The domestic rate, which is the operative number for an Iranian buyer, stands at 2,271,920 rials this morning, 890 rials higher. Its relationship to the free-market dollar has flipped: tether now sits 7,080 rials below the last free-market dollar close, or 0.31 percent lower, whereas in our 25 Shahrivar report the same tether stood 0.30 percent above the free-market dollar. The two usual caveats hold: these two readings are not taken at the same hour and the ratio must be measured again once the banknote market opens today; and the difference in kind between the two numbers must be kept in mind, because bitcoin is measured in dollars while the rial tether price embeds the exchange rate as well.

Away from prices, one institutional event was recorded that bears directly on Iran: the US Treasury sanctioned the Tehran crypto exchange BitBank over the role it attributes to the platform in a Strait of Hormuz transit toll scheme (US Treasury Office of Foreign Assets Control, 26 Shahrivar).

8. Iron and Steel

After a four-session gap, the rebar family took a fresh settlement on the Iran Mercantile Exchange on Wednesday 25 Shahrivar, and it came in lower. Ribbed rebar A3 in sizes 14 to 20 settled at 851,260 rials per kilogram, 6,840 rials and 0.80 percent below the 858,100 rial settlement of 18 Shahrivar; sizes 22 to 32 settled at 848,619 rials, 24,100 rials and 2.76 percent below the 872,720 rials of the same date.

And the gap between the official board and the mill rate widened. Arian Foulad's recorded rates for Friday 27 Shahrivar are: rebar 14 A3 at 930,900 rials, 12 A3 at 939,100 rials, 10 A3 at 944,500 rials, 12 A2 at 931,800 rials and 10 A2 at 943,600 rials. For rebar 14, the distance between the mill rate and the exchange settlement for the same size is 79,640 rials and 9.36 percent. In our 25 Shahrivar report the same gap was 64,600 rials and 7.53 percent. The mechanism is clear and needs no added assumption: the exchange settlement fell while the mill rate rose, so both ends of the calculation widened the gap in the same direction. Boursenews also reported that 343,000 tonnes of product were sold on the Iran Mercantile Exchange last week (28 Shahrivar). Globally, Shanghai rebar stands at 3,099 yuan per tonne (Friday 27 Shahrivar, 19:55).

9. Cars

The car market was quiet and produced no new reading. In the Friday 27 Shahrivar reading, the Dena Plus Turbo Automatic Optional model 1405 was recorded at 33,800,000,000 rials and the 1404 model at 32,500,000,000 rials, the Dena Plus 6-speed at 24,700,000,000 rials for 1405 and 23,700,000,000 rials for 1404, and the Dena Plus Low Option 1404 at 22,700,000,000 rials. All five rows are unchanged from the previous reading, the third consecutive reading without movement. The gap between a carmaker's share price and the price of a car should not be conflated: what has stayed still here is the car market price.

10. Building Materials

Cement took a fresh settlement on Wednesday 25 Shahrivar and rose slightly. Type 2 (42.5) bulk cement settled at a volume-weighted average of 26,366 rials per kilogram, 116 rials and 0.44 percent above the 26,250 rial settlement of 24 Shahrivar. Type 2 (32.5) bulk settled at 25,189 rials and type 5 (42.5) bulk at 28,113 rials. The usual caveat holds: an exchange settlement is that day's volume-weighted average across every producer that sold, so one fall and one small rise across two sessions reflects a change in the mix of sellers more than a trend.

On the board, cement funds did not move in one direction: Simana fell 2.94 percent to 40,758 rials, the Cement fund fell 2.71 percent to 10,577 rials, Simano fell 0.43 percent to 43,037 rials, and Simania rose 1.65 percent to 41,400 rials (Wednesday 25 Shahrivar).

11. Regional and Global View

Brent crude stands at 103.87 dollars this morning, 4.14 dollars and 3.83 percent below our 25 Shahrivar reading. Oil's third consecutive falling session coincided with Saudi Arabia's move to restore flow through its east to west pipeline, while tanker traffic through the Strait of Hormuz fell to four vessels and Saudi exports from Ras Tanura surged (Energy Connects via Bloomberg and OilPrice, 27 Shahrivar). The channel from this number to Tehran is direct: Brent moves both export revenue and the freight and insurance cost of imports. CENTCOM claims that despite the blockade, more than 900 million barrels of oil have crossed Hormuz since May (Al Jazeera, 26 Shahrivar).

Three monetary decisions were recorded in global policy in one week: the Federal Reserve raised its rate by 0.25 percentage points, the Bank of Japan lifted its rate to 1.25 percent, the highest in 31 years, and the Bank of England held at 3.75 percent. Their channel to Tehran runs through spot gold and the dollar index. From East Asia, China's refined fuel exports rose 12.7 percent in August to 6.01 million tonnes, a figure that reaches regional prices through refining demand (OilPrice citing Reuters and Chinese customs data, 27 Shahrivar).

In the regional corridors, the week's news came from Türkiye: the Istanbul exchange's BIST 100 index fell 5.54 percent on Wednesday, the banking index lost more than 8.5 percent, the IPO index more than 9 percent, and over 60 stocks hit their price floors (Donya-e-Eqtesad citing Ekonomi Gazetesi, 28 Shahrivar). Türkiye's channel to Tehran runs through border trade and the lira rate. In West Asia, Houthi forces took control of the port of Mokha and key Bab al-Mandeb islands, an event that ties the southern Red Sea shipping route directly to the question of freight costs (Khabar Online, 27 Shahrivar).

12. Conclusion

Today's verdict is this: Shahrivar was the month of the large caps, not the month of the market. The headline index rose 24.5 percent and the equal-weight index 16.5 percent, and those 8 points of distance are exactly what separates "the bourse set a record" from "my share went up". Sahmino's previous reading settles here, and it proved right: we said the headline index would stay above 7.4 million points as long as retail investors did not turn net sellers, and the week ended with the headline index at 7,557,642 points and no close below 7,393,272, so both the level and the condition held. The one thing to remember is this: when the headline index sets a record, look at the equal-weight index too, because that is the one that tells you whether the gain was concentrated in a few shares or spread across the whole board. Sahmino's new reading: the gap between Tehran's headline and equal-weight indices stays below 10 percentage points, as long as the equal-weight index closes above 2 million points; the level of this reading is 2,000,000 points, its horizon is the end of this week, and a close of the equal-weight index below 1,994,188 points, the Monday 23 Shahrivar close, invalidates it (reading dated 28 Shahrivar 1405 / 19 September 2026).

13. What to Watch Today

• The 9:00 open of the Tehran Stock Exchange after two closed days, and whether the equal-weight index holds the 2 million point line; that is the level today's reading is tied to.
• The fate of Mobarakeh Steel's pre-opening buy queue of 115 million shares, and whether the symbol records a tenth consecutive higher close.
• The twelve ordinary general meetings on today's calendar, including those of Sarv, Padf, Payf and Etemad Tamaddon. Sahmino's market calendar shows the coming events at a glance.
• Whether the 687 trillion rial retail turnover record repeats in the week's first session or proves a single-session peak.
• Today's first banknote market pricing and which way the gap between the free-market dollar and the Exchange Center remittance rate, which stood at 620,209 rials on Thursday, moves.
• A fresh settlement for the rebar family on the Iran Mercantile Exchange, after the mill-to-settlement gap reached 9.36 percent.
• The effect of Kakhak's new rates applied from 26 Shahrivar, following board approval for an average 29 percent increase in processed kaolin prices and 19 percent in graded kaolin.