RECORDER REPORT

KARACHI: Pakistan Stock Exchange Monday witnessed a positive trend on the back of fresh buying in various sectors.

The benchmark KSE-100 Index increased by 133.75 points or 0.32 percent and closed at 42,347.23 points. The index hit 42,675.22 points intraday high however closed slightly lower due to profit-taking in some stocks.

Daily trading volumes on ready counter stood at 226.743 million shares as compared to 289.586 million shares traded on last Friday while total daily traded value on ready counter declined to Rs 6.052 billion against previous session’s Rs 7.870 billion.

BRIndex100 gained 14.18 points or 0.33 percent to close at 4,247.23 points with total daily turnover of 183.127 million shares.

BRIndex30 surged by 148.37 points or 0.93 percent to close at 16,030.91 points with total daily trading volumes of 143.359 million shares.

Foreign investors however remained net sellers of shares worth $370,944. Total market capitalization increased by Rs 10 billion to Rs 6.849 trillion. Out of total 343 active scrips, 160 closed in positive and 149 in negative while the value of 34 stocks remained unchanged. WorldCall Telecom was the volume leader with 68.789 million shares and gained Rs 0.07 to close at Rs 1.59 followed by Dewan Motors that closed at Rs 11.21, up Rs 0.92 with 12.410 million shares. Pak Refinery inched up by Rs 0.10 to close at Rs 17.91 with 9.543 million shares.

Colgate Palmolive and Mari Petroleum were the top gainers increasing by Rs 40.19 and Rs 26.74 respectively to close at Rs 2,062.50 and Rs 1,710.23 while Gatron Industries and Sitara Chemical were the top losers declining by Rs 31.20 and Rs 18.74 respectively to close at Rs 384.80 and Rs 231.25.

Mubashir Anis Naviwala at JS Global Capital said that the KSE-100 index kicked off on a positive note on back of Pakistan’s removal from FATF’s grey list and touched an intraday high of plus 459 points. The index eventually closed at the level of 42,347, gaining 134 points compared to previous close. Traded volumes stood at 227mn shares where WTL (up 4.6 percent), DFML (up 8.9 percent), PRL (up 0.6 percent), HASCOL (up 1.8 percent) and TRG (up 3.1 percent) were the major contributors.

BR Automobile Assembler Index gained 21.87 points or 0.23 percent to close at 9,379.72 points with total turnover of 12.724 million shares.

BR Cement Index lost 12.76 points or 0.27 percent to close at 4,642.69 points with 13.947 million shares.

BR Commercial Banks Index fell by 11.62 points or 0.14 percent to close at 8,217.09 points with 6.185 million shares.

BR Power Generation and Distribution Index increased by 70.85 points or 1.06 percent to close at 6,762.25 points with 13.492 million shares.

BR Oil and Gas Index inched up by 18.72 points or 0.5 percent to close at 3,763.60 points with 13.560 million shares.

BR Tech. & Comm. Index closed at 4,430.53 points, up 59.82 points or 1.37 percent with 90.242 million shares.

An analyst at Arif Habib Limited said that the benchmark KSE-100 index witnessed a range bound session. Despite having astounding news that Pakistan has been taken off from the “grey list” of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), the PSX was unable to capitalize from it because of political upheaval as investor’s participation remained sideways. The main board had reasonable volumes, although the top volume leaders remained the third-tier stocks.

Sectors contributing to the performance include Technology and Communication (up 46.9 points), Fertilizer (up 40.9 points), E&P (up 24.4 points), Power Generation and Distribution (up 22.6 points) and Automobile Parts and Accessories (up 7.2 points).