Market watch : Activity slows down as index creeps up

Announcements of company results fail to attract investment.


Express April 28, 2011

KARACHI:


After two days of result-related excitement, equities on Thursday lost steam and volumes remained on the lower side, despite some key result announcements.


The Karachi Stock Exchange (KSE) 100-share index gained 0.16 per cent or 19.23 points to close at 11,966.67 points.

Trade volumes fell to 113.5 million shares compared with Wednesday’s tally of 143.73 million shares. Foreign investors were said to be buyers in energy scrips, while locals were buyers in refineries and third-tier banks.

Silkbank dominated the volumes chart for the day as it saw trading in 35 million shares on the back of its first quarter results, which showed a 110 per cent growth in earnings. Nishat Mills also witnessed some excitement early in the day in connection with its result expectation. However, despite registering a 44.7 per cent growth in nine-month earnings compared with the same period last year, it failed to induce any excitement and closed in the red, losing 0.74 per cent, said Elixir Securities analyst Sara Shahid.

Pakistan State Oil also closed marginally lower as it declared a result that was slightly below market expectations, despite announcement of Rs3 per share cash payout. As major corporate result announcements end on Friday, analysts believe a range-bound activity will be witnessed in the short term.

Shares of 372 companies were traded on Thursday. At the end of the day, 145 stocks closed higher, 145 declined and 82 remained unchanged. The value of shares traded during the day was Rs3.33 billion.

Silkbank was the volume leader with 38.85 million shares, gaining Rs0.62 to close at Rs2.85. It was followed by Lotte Pakistan PTA with 10.96 million shares, losing Rs0.12 to close at Rs16.89 and NIB Bank with 7.79 million shares, gaining Rs0.19 to close at Rs1.97.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 29th, 2011.

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