Range-bound activity on LSE

There was range-bound activity on Lahore Stock Exchange (LSE) with the equities showing an erratic movement, however last-minute recovery in PTCL helped the index make a bullish closing.
The LSE-25 index ended with a net gain of 21.60 points or 0.50 percent reaching 4265.24 from 4243.64 points of the preceding session. Overall transaction volume slightly improved to 85.933 million shares from 85.204 million of the previous session.
The sentiment stayed depressed in the morning, as people responded negatively to the press reports, saying the Government of Pakistan had given more time to Etisalat for making payment.
There is no guarantee that Etisalat will honour the deal within the new time frame, that has been extended to 20 months, thus the movement has disappointed people, a broker said. In last minutes, recovery was seen in PTCL as well as buying in small shares, which pushed the index in the plus column.
According to stock analysts, the market range-bound behaviour was likely to continue Tuesday, if blue chips' performance remained dismal. On Monday, ICI Pakistan and PICIC Growth Fund emerged, as top losers while PSO and PPL were the prime losers.
Mirza Muhammad Irfan, equity research head of Capital Vision Securities Ltd, said the that Privatisation Commission has extended the payment schedule to 20 months for PTCL deal with Etisalat, which depressed the sentiment in early session, but later the market recovered and ended with a bullish note. PTCL, cements and gas distribution companies delivered well in second half of the session, while SNGPL touched its upper level cap, he added.
However, in anticipation of decline in the price in the domestic market oil sector was depressed, he further said. According to him, oil prices in the international market are showing decline due to which the rate is expected to come down in the domestic market.
Although, the government will be trying to hold the prices at the existing levels for another 15 days to meet is revenue shortfall, but it seems the government will not be able to stay before the public pressure. So it will have to decrease the prices, though marginally, he pointed out. One of the significant aspects which was noted Monday was that small banks also showed good movement, he said, adding now people are preferring small stocks instead of making risky investments in blue chips.
But it is also a fact that until there is upward movement in big stocks, the index will not be going up, he pointed out. If the market maintains the current levels for a few sessions, room for upward movement will grow further, Irfan said.
Out of a total of 87 traded scrips, 32 were up, 13 landed in negative column, while 42 were unchanged. Among key gainers, ICI Pakistan improved by Rs 8.25, PICIC Growth Fund Rs 2.70, Nishat Mills Rs 2.65, Sui Northern Rs 2.55 and Bank Alfalah Rs 2.20. In negative column, PSO declined by Rs 5.00, PPL Rs 4.10, Askari Commercial Bank Rs 2.50, OGDC Rs 1.85 and Fauji Fertiliser Re 1.00.
Fauji Cement was the volume leader with 12.134 million shares followed by PTCL with 10.650 million shares.