KSE-100 extends losses as profit-taking persists

Profit-takers held sway over the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) as its benchmark KSE-100 lost another 251 points on Wednesday.

Cautious investors kept the KSE-100 range-bound in the first half of the session and further pushed the index below 64,000 level before closing.

At close, the benchmark index settled at 63,919.85, down by 250.73 points or 0.39%.

On Tuesday, the KSE-100 closed down by 66.45 points as it faced both bullish and bearish sentiment.

In the three sessions this week, the KSE-100 has lost nearly 600 points.

On Wednesday, investors chose to do profit-taking in selective stocks of banks and fertiliser sectors in the backdrop of increasing noise at the political front and absence of any positive trigger, making a 5th consecutive negative session at the PSX, brokerage house Topline Securities stated in its post-market report.

In a related development on Wednesday, the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) data showed that inflow of overseas workers’ remittances clocked in at $2.4 billion in December 2023, 5.4% higher on a month-on-month basis when compared to $2.25 billion in November 2023.

On the political front, the Peshawar High Court (PHC) declared as unconstitutional the Election Commission of Pakistan’s decision that had revoked the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf’s (PTI) ‘bat’ electoral symbol and rejecting its intra-party polls.

Meanwhile, the rupee maintained its upward trajectory against the US dollar for the sixth successive session, appreciating a marginal 0.03% in the inter-bank market on Wednesday. As per the State Bank of Pakistan, the local unit settled at 281.13 after an increase of Re0.09 against the greenback.

Volume on the all-share index increased to 636 million from 449 million a session before.

The value of shares rose to Rs18 billion from Rs12.3 billion in the previous session.

K-Electric Ltd was the volume leader with 151.2 million shares, followed by Hascol Petrol with 68 million shares, and WorldCall Telecom at 42 million shares.

Shares of 361 companies were traded on Wednesday, of which 155 registered an increase, 183 recorded a fall, while 23 remained unchanged.