Sri Lankan shares fall 1% as industrials, financials weigh

Sri Lankan shares closed over 1% lower on Monday, hurt by losses in financial and industrial stocks.

The CSE All-Share index settled down 1.21% at 8,983.74. On Friday, the index closed at 0.6% lower, but saw a weekly gain of 0.5%, a first in three weeks.

LOLC Holdings Plc and Expolanka Holdings Plc were the top drags on the index, falling 6.9% and 3%, respectively.

Sri Lanka President Ranil Wickremesinghe’s office said on Sunday he discussed restructuring of the country’s debt with the finance minister of China, which is the largest bilateral lender of the island nation.

Trading volume on the CSE All-Share index fell to 69.6 million shares on Monday, from 117.4 million shares in the previous session.

The equity market’s turnover was 1.88 billion Sri Lankan rupees ($5.18 million), according to exchange data.

Foreign investors were net buyers in the equity market, purchasing 136.1 million rupees of shares, while domestic investors were net sellers, offloading stocks worth 1.83 billion rupees, data showed.