Dull trading on KSE

After witnessing a highly volatile session amid thin volumes Karachi share market finally managed to close in the positive with the benchmark KSE-100 index gaining 19.58 points to close at 7,081.83 points on Tuesday. The market opened on a positive note and the index hit 7,146.08 points intra-day high, up by 83.83 points.
However, this momentum could not continue due to investors'' lack of confidence, which dropped the index into negative zone to 7,027.67 points intra-day low level, down by 34.58 points. The index moved many times in the positive and the negative areas before closing in the green.
Trading activity remained dull as the volumes at ready counter dropped to 96.921 million shares as compared to 123.539 million shares traded on Monday. The overall market capitalisation slightly increased by Rs 4 billion to Rs 2.109 trillion. Out of the total 337 active scrips, 205 closed in the negative and 111 in the positive while the value of 21 scrips remained unchanged.
Jahangir Siddiqui Co was the volume leader with 7.444 million shares; however, it lost Rs 1.41 to close at 26.97. Bosicor Pakistan gained Re. 0.58 to close at Rs 7.57 with 6.871 million shares. In the banking sector, NBP gained Re. 0.12 to close at Rs 72.29 with 5.218 million shares; however, Bank Al Falah lost Re. 0.15 to close at Rs 11.22 with 4.910 million shares.
Fresh buying was witnessed in the E&P sector, as OGDC and PPL surged by Rs 1.47 and Rs 3.61 to close at Rs 74.45 and Rs 171.08 with 5.117 million shares and 3.158 million shares, respectively. Arif Habib Sec lost Re. 0.81 to close at Rs 23.01 with 4.840 million shares.
Lucky Cement gained Re. 0.54 to close at Rs 55.35 with 3.236 million shares. Hub Power Company increased by Re. 0.21 to close at Rs 26.29 with 3.122 million shares. Attock Refinery surged by Rs 5.00 to close at Rs 122.55 with 2.975 million shares.
Siemens Pakistan and Unilever Pakistan were the highest gainers and gained Rs 39.25 and Rs 10.00 to close at Rs 839.25 and Rs 1980.00, respectively while Nestle Pakistan and Hinopak Motor were the worst losers and lost Rs 20.00 and Rs 8.27 to close at Rs 980.00 and Rs 157.17, respectively.
Khurram Schehzad, senior analyst at Invest Capital and Securities said that investors remained cautious over the law and order situation after the strike call for May 12, 2009 and preferred to offload their holdings. Absence of any leverage product after discontinuation of CFS Mk-II and liquidity issue also discouraged the market participants to take fresh positions.
Thin volumes show the investors lack of confidence as they are not ready to enter the market before the budget, he said and added that historically the market has been witnessing thin volumes before the announcement of the budget.
He said that rumours regarding a possible increase in CVT also affected the market sentiment negatively as the majority of market players are in favour of imposition of Capital Gain Tax rather than increase in CVT rate. He was expecting a positive activity after inclusion of Pakistan index in MSCI Frontier Index from May 29, 2009.