RECORDER REPORT

KARACHI: The Supreme Court ruling on the Panamagate case triggered a swift rally at Pakistan Stock Exchange Thursday. The benchmark KSE-100 index hit 49,505.94 points intra-day high, with the highest-ever singly day increase of 1902.46 points.

However, some investors opted to book profit at this level that minimized the intra-day gains and the index closed at 48,743.56 points with a net gain of 1,140.08 points.

Due to aggressive buying in different sectors, trading activity improved significantly as daily trading volumes increased by 54 percent to 408.163 million shares as compared to 265.684 million shares traded Wednesday. The market capitalization increased by Rs 184 billion to Rs 9.605 trillion. Out of total 395 active scrips, 320 closed in positive, only 64 in negative while the value of 11 stocks remained unchanged. Local investors and institutions were the major buyers, however foreigners were the net sellers of share worth $5.719 million.

K-Electric was the volume leader with 29.224 million shares. However, it lost Rs 0.06 to close at Rs 8.18 followed by Engro Polymer that gained Rs 0.51 to close at Rs 26.18 with 27.638 million shares. TRG Pak increased by Rs 2.33 to close at Rs 52.83 with 20.966 million shares.

Sanofi-Aventis and Sapphire Fiber were the top gainers with Rs 94.00 and Rs 54.62, respectively to close at Rs 1,992.00 and Rs 1,147.12. Rafhan Maize and Unilever Foods were the top losers with Rs 75.00 and Rs 49.00, respectively to close at Rs 7,125.00 and Rs 6,201.00.

An analyst at Topline Securities said that the investors at PSX cheered the long-awaited verdict. In point terms, the increase of 1902 points is the largest-ever single day upside move. Key points of the verdict are insufficient evidence against the Prime Minister, SC ordered further investigation and directed formation of Joint Investigation Team (JIT) comprising FIA, NAB, MI/ISI, SECP and others and the JIT has been given a timeframe of 60 days to complete its investigation.

Nabeel Haroon at JS Global Capital said that market opened on a negative note as it fell to make an intraday low of negative 242 points; however, market took a sharp swing from its low to form its intraday high at 1,902 points. Hefty buying in the market during the course of the trading hours can be attributed to the verdict of Supreme Court on a long awaited high profile political case. HBL (up 3.33 percent) and MEBL (up 5.00 percent) in the banking sector gained as both the banking companies declared their first quarter 2017 results. ASTL gained to close on its upper circuit as the steel company announced its expansion plan along with its nine months of FY17 earnings announcement. SHEL (up 3.08 percent) in the OMC sector garnered investor interest as the company posted robust growth in its bottom line to declare earnings of Rs. 13.05/share.