Market watch: Index breaks past 40,000 level, but gains trimmed in last hour

Benchmark KSE-100 index rises 46.04 points

KARACHI: Backed by financial and oil stocks, the benchmark-100 index broke the 40,000-point barrier for the first time and stayed over it for almost the entire day before last-hour profit-booking trimmed the gains.

However, the Pakistan Stock Exchange’s (PSX) benchmark KSE-100 index still ended positive, but below the 40,000 level as it lost close to 200 points in less than an hour, recording an eventual increase of 0.12% or 46.04 points to end at 39,907.64.



Elixir Securities analyst Faisal Bilwani said equities closed marginally positive after trading volatile with a brief pit-stop above 40,000 level. “A gap opened up by oils was followed by aggressive buying in financials, primarily in United Bank (UBL +0.4%). However, volumes in the wider market during the morning session were thin on cautious trading.

“The second session was nerve-wracking with KSE-100 index nose-diving and wiping all of the day’s gains on across the board institutional led profit taking. K-Electric (KEL -1.1%) traded lower yet managed to hold its ground firm with over 56 million shares traded after Thursday’s notification by the management denying acquisition rumours.

“With little news and no major earnings announcement, small caps led the volumes on retail investor’s participation.”

Meanwhile, JS Global, in its report, stated that positivity prevailed as the index rallied to make an intraday high of +221 points but came under selling pressure during the latter hours.

According to JS Global analyst Nabeel Haroon, exploration and production (E&P) and banking sector led the gains in the market. “Pakistan Petroleum (PPL +2.38%), Pakistan Oilfields (POL +0.72%) and OGDC (+1.12%) in the E&P sector gained, as crude oil prices comfortably traded above its previous day close for most part of the day. UBL (0.39%) and MCB (+1.03%) led the rally in the banking sector.

“Inter Steel (ISL +0.39%) gained to close in the green zone as the company declared its result for the fiscal year 2016. The company declared earnings per share of Rs2.71 with a full year dividend of Rs1.25 per share.”

Trade volumes fell to 278 million shares compared with Thursday’s tally of 385 million shares.

Shares of 394 companies were traded on Friday. At the end of the day, 202 stocks closed higher, 170 declined while 22 remained unchanged. The value of shares traded during the day was Rs12.1 billion.



K-Electric was the volume leader with 56.2 million shares, losing Rs0.10 to finish at Rs8.71. It was followed by Dewan Motors with 15.3 million shares, gaining Rs0.98 to close at Rs21.19 and Dewan Salman with 15 million shares, gaining Rs0.15 to close at Rs3.33.

Foreign institutional investors were net sellers of Rs128 million during the trade session, according to data maintained by the National Clearing Company of Pakistan Limited.

Published in The Express Tribune, August 13^th, 2016.

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