Market watch: KSE-100 crosses 47,000 points with thin gains

Activity hits the highest in 10 weeks amid a smooth political transition

KARACHI: Despite recording a marginal growth, the stock market ended above 47,000 points on the back of strong activity in industrial and consumer companies on Thursday.

As political uncertainty emanating from the Panama case verdict eases gradually, retail investors seemed to have gained confidence in the market as 455 million shares changed hands among them.

At close, the benchmark KSE 100-share Index recorded a rise of 135.30 points or 0.29% to finish the day at 47,084.34.

According to Elixir Securities, Pakistan equities crawled slightly higher to settle above 47,000 points with index names seeing only modest gains.

"Activity, on the other hand, showed a remarkable surge as was evident from volumes on the KSE All-share Index that stood above 455 million shares, the highest in the last 10 weeks," Elixir said in its report.



A reduction in the political noise post-Panama verdict and a smooth transition afterwards with new prime minister taking charge seemed to have revived retail investor's confidence, it said.

Reluctantly, industrial and consumer sideboards generated most action on retail interest. K-Electric (+7.7%) and The Bank of Punjab (+4.8%) dominated the volumes chart as more than 40 million shares were traded in each of them.

"Seeing consolidation at current levels, however, compelling valuations and domestic liquidity are expected to support a significant enough push to take the KSE-100 index to 48,000 in the days ahead," the report added.

JS Global analyst Maaz Mulla said the market continued its positive momentum with profit-taking in select stocks, hitting an intra-day high of +218 points and an intra-day low of -91 points.



“A rally was seen in banking and oil and gas stocks. Pakistan Oilfields (+1.23%) and Oil and Gas Development Company (+0.64%) gained to close in the green zone as oil prices rose in the international market,” said Mulla.

Commercial bank heavyweights including Habib Bank (+1.11%), MCB Bank (+2.01%), National Bank (+0.59%) and Allied Bank (+1.07%) cumulatively contributed +77 points to the KSE-100 index.

However, downward pressure was witnessed in oil and gas marketing stocks as Shell (-0.55%), Sui Northern Gas Pipelines (-1.89%) and Sui Southern Gas Company (-0.46%) shed value.

“Moving forward, we expect positivity to continue as the market recovers post-political jitters and recommend investors to book profits on strength,” Mulla added.



Overall, trading volumes rose to 455 million shares compared with Wednesday's tally of 367 million.

Shares of 405 companies were traded. At the end of the day, 242 stocks closed higher, 147 declined while 16 remained unchanged. The value of shares traded during the day was Rs16.1 billion.

K-Electric Limited was the volume leader with 44.6 million shares, gaining Rs0.53 to close at Rs7.45. It was followed by The Bank of Punjab with 43.2 million shares, gaining Rs0.55 to close at Rs11.91 and Azgard Nine with 33.5 million shares, gaining Rs1.00 to close at Rs15.93.

Foreign institutional investors were net sellers of Rs965 million during the trading session, according to data compiled by the National Clearing Company of Pakistan Limited.