Market watch: Foreigners become buyers, index still down

Benchmark KSE-100 index falls 193.27 points.

KARACHI: Trading activity continued to remain lacklustre with the index closing negative for the fourth successive session as investors continued to exercise caution.

At close on Tuesday, the Karachi Stock Exchange’s (KSE) benchmark 100-share index fell 0.58% or 193.27 points to end at 33,191.46.

Elixir Securities analyst Faisal Bilwani said equities closed negative session with KSE-100 index testing support near 33,100.



“Stocks opened sideways and traded mix throughout the day as investors continued to ignore fundamentals and remained cautious; while any help in the shape of institutional flows remained missing.

“Activity in the wider market remained muted, however, fertilisers garnered some interest mid-day with news of the premier announcing a Rs341-billion relief package for farmers and cutting the costs of fertilisers by Rs500 per sack.”

Meanwhile, JS Global analyst Ahmed Saeed Khan said cherry picking was witnessed in the cement sector.

“After the announcement of efforts to take back the recent urea price hike, fertiliser sector rebounded a little, where major beneficiary of this would be Fauji Fertilizer Bin Qasim Limited (+2.40%) as this would entail that the price increase by Fauji Fertilizer Company Limited and Engro Fertilizer Limited per bag would be taken back shortly.”

On the other hand, Abbasi Securities stated the rate cut announced in the monetary policy kept banks under pressure.

“Major losers were Habib Bank Limited (-0.90%), United Bank Limited (-2.34%) and MCB Bank Limited (-3.53%). Oil and Gas followed the decline shaving almost 30 points from the index at day end.

“We expect investors to remain cautious ahead of the US Federal Reserve’s meeting on the interest rate this week.”

Trade volumes fell slightly to 132.2 million shares compared with Monday’s tally of 133.6 million shares.



Shares of 366 companies were traded on Tuesday. At the end of the day, 110 stocks closed higher, 229 declined while 27 remained unchanged. The value of shares traded during the day was Rs6.5 billion.

TRG Pakistan Limited was the volume leader with 10.3 million shares, losing Rs0.40 to finish at Rs31.37. It was followed by Byco Petroleum Pakistan Limited with 7.9 million shares, losing Rs1.03 to close at Rs23.99 and Jahangir Siddiqui and Company Limited (XR) with 7.7 million shares, gaining Rs1.00 to close at Rs19.55.

Foreign institutional investors were net buyers of Rs163.7 million during the trade session, according to data maintained by the National Clearing Company of Pakistan Limited.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 16^th,  2015.

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