The share market ended at 38,470 points, down 307 points Monday weighed mainly by institutional profit-taking. The benchmark KSE-100 index showed volatility by moving both ways to hit the intraday high and low of 38,981 and 38,470 points. Trading turnover rose to 149 million shares the value of which contracted to Rs 9.93 billion from the previous Rs 11.28 billion. Of the 327 scrips traded, 123 posted gains, 184 declined and that of 20 stayed unchanged.
The market capital accumulated to Rs 7.66 trillion. Pak Electron led volumes with 19 million shares, each priced higher at Rs 67.83. other best performing stocks were K-Electric, PIBT, Engro fertiliser, Dolmen City REIT, Bank Al-Falah, TRG Pakistan, Bank of Punjab, HBL and Attock Refinery. Compared to 25 million, futures trade saw 62 million contracts changing hands marking the start of rollover week.
"Institutional profit-taking was witnessed in overbought market," said Ahsan Mehanti of Arif Habib Corp. Auto stocks outperformed the index on reports for surging sales, he said. "Institutional support remained in oil stocks on rising global crude prices and surge in global equities," the analyst said. Pressure remained in bluechip stocks amid consolidation post MSCI upgrade.
Topline analysts said the index fell by 0.8 percent due to profit-taking, specifically in banks and other MSCI-based stocks. Also, they said, the market showed weakness because of start of futures rollover. Banks that had rallied on the back of news of MSCI upgrade of Pakistan market to Emerging Markets last week came off with BKTi index down 3 percent. Habib Bank and United Bank lost 3.3 and 3.0 percent.
Refinery sector was positive because of news of government willingness to increase deemed duty on diesel from 7.5-9.0 percent. Attock Refinery and National Refinery rallied 4.2 and 3.0 percent. In what analysts said a bid to prop up agricultural sector, the government decided to reduce general sales tax on imported and locally manufactured tractors from 10-5 percent, which would bring down prices by Rs 35k-80k, depending on engine capacity. Resultantly, Al-Ghazi Tractor closed at its upper limit and Millat Tractor rose by 4.5 percent.
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