Market watch: Stock market witnesses another dull day

Benchmark KSE-100 index adds 6 points.

KARACHI: Wednesday saw a lacklustre trading session at the stock market, as investors chose to remain cautious ahead of the Supreme Court hearing of the NRO implementation and Memogate cases scheduled for today.

“[The] market witnessed yet another dull session today, ahead of a Supreme Court hearing in which the new Prime Minister has been called to court to brief about the implementation of the judgment on the NRO,” reported Jawad Khan, analyst at JS Global.

“The gainers from previous sessions – mainly fertiliser and cement stocks – stayed under pressure due to profit-taking by local participants from retail and corporate circuits, thus keeping the benchmark in the reddish zone for most of the session,” added Hasnain Asghar Ali, analyst at Escorts Capital.

The Karachi Stock Exchange’s (KSE) benchmark 100-share index closed up marginally by 0.04% or 6.12 points to end at the 14,380.46 points level. Trade volumes declined to 81 million shares compared with Tuesday’s tally of 83 million shares. The value of shares traded during the day was Rs2.37 billion. Shares of 374 companies were traded on Wednesday. At the end of the day 131 stocks closed higher, 120 declined while 123 remained unchanged.

“There was no clear winner in the market today as the market remained mixed,” observed Khan. “Lucky Cement closed down 0.4%, as rumours that manufacturers in the south have raised cement prices could not be confirmed till the market closed.”

“DG Khan Cement remained in the limelight, as investors are eager to evaluate its profitability for the year ending June 2012,” added Samar Iqbal, equity dealer at Topline Securities. “Engro Foods also posted some gains ahead of its June quarter results.”

DG Khan Cement was the volume leader with 8.83 million shares losing Rs0.66 to finish at Rs42.94. It was followed by Jahangir Siddiqui Company with 7.55 million shares gaining Rs0.21 to close at Rs14.32 and Engro Foods with 6.80 million shares gaining Rs0.10 to close at Rs73.41.

Foreign institutional investors were net buyers of Rs111.43 million, according to data maintained by the National Clearing Company of Pakistan Limited.

Published in The Express Tribune, July 12^th, 2012.