Range-bound activity witnessed

The Karachi share market witnessed range-bound activity during the week ended April 20, 2012 and benchmark KSE-100 index finally closed at 13,936.48 points, up 137.05 points on week-on-week basis.
Trading activity remained low during the week as average daily volumes at ready counter declined by 28.2 percent to 268.68 million shares against the previous week's average volume of 374.1 million shares. Total market capitalisation increased by Rs31 billion to Rs3.568 trillion.
Foreign investors remained net buyers of shares worth $8.14 million during the week against net inflows of just $2.3 million last week.
The market opened under pressure on Monday and the index declined by 28.72 points to close at 13,770.71 points with total volume of 261.021 million shares. This trend continued on Tuesday and the index lost another 6.49 points to close at 13,764.22 points with 268.727 million shares.
On Wednesday, the market witnessed a bullish session on account of across the board buying and the index surged by 173.73 points to close at 13,937.95 points with 261.515 million shares. Investors on Thursday opted for profit-taking and the index lost 8.48 points to close at 13,929.47 points with 307.931 million shares. The index breached 14,000-point level on Friday to hit 14,059.87 points. However, it finally closed at 13,936.48 points with 244.205 million shares.
"The market witnessed yet another week of range-bound activity as investors stayed put on the much-awaited SRO issuance by the Presidency for implementation of the reformed CGT regime, but remained cautious over further delay," Hasan Raza, an analyst at InvestCap said.
The prevailing uncertainty related to the timing of the issuance of the SRO seemed to be curbing investors' interest in the market amid speculations that it could be delayed till the budget announcement, he added.
Furqan Ayub at JS Global Capital said that mixed sentiments were witnessed at the local bourse during the week after SBP's decision to keep the discount rate unchanged at 12 percent.
He said the decision was in line with market expectations. However, the decision to raise the minimum profit rate to 6 percent for savings deposits surprised the market. As a result, selective profit-taking was evident in the market mainly in the banking sector during the week.
He said the SBP's decision to increase the minimum rate on savings deposits to 6 percent from 5 percent triggered a negative trend among banking stocks, adding that this was likely to hurt their net interest margins.