BRIndex100 extends losses

Pakistan Stock Exchange witnessed another bearish session due to selling by local and foreign investors. BRIndex100 lost 28.67 points or 0.61 percent to close at 4,667.21 points Wednesday. BRIndex100 touched intraday high of 4,712.06 and intraday low of 4,611.33 points. Volumes stood at 151.339 million shares. BRIndex30 decreased by 203.52 points or 0.86 percent to close at 23,406.53 points with a turnover of 76.984 million shares.
The benchmark KSE-100 index declined by 271.96 points or 0.62 percent to close below 44,000 level at 43,795.00 points. Daily trading volumes increased to 191.850 million shares as compared to 153.514 million shares traded Tuesday.
Foreign investors remained net sellers of shares worth $4.9 million. The market capitalization declined by Rs 67 billion to Rs 9.029 trillion. Out of total 378 active scrips, 267 closed in negative, only 93 in positive while the value of 18 stocks remained unchanged.
1st Dawood Bank was the volume leader with 11.085 million shares. It gained Re 1.00 to close at Rs 4.01 followed by Invest Bank that increased by Re 1.00 to close at Rs 2.76 with 10.411 million shares. Unilever Foods and Rafhan Maize were the top gainers with Rs 399.01 and Rs 207.92, respectively to close at Rs 8,899.00 and Rs 8,307.92 while Sapphire Textile and Pak Tobacco were the top losers with Rs 82.52 and Rs 57.00, respectively to close at Rs 1,622.94 and Rs 2,000.00.
BR Commercial Banks Index lost 6.27 points or 0.07 percent to close at 8,684.61 points with total turnover of 12.728 million shares.
BR Cement Index plunged by 114.38 points or 2.05 percent to close at 5,458.04 points with 20.249 million shares.
BR Oil and Gas Index decreased by 26.01 points or 0.47 percent to close at 5,485.84 points with 18.586 million shares.
BR Tech. & Comm. Index closed at 1,165.07 points, down 1.7 points or 0.15 percent with 10.472 million shares.
BR Power Generation and Distribution Index declined by 53.57 points or 0.81 percent to close at 6,535.67 points with 5.983 million shares.
Ahsan Mehanti at Arif Habib Corporation said that sentiments remained weak at PSX amid higher trades on concerns for rising political noise. He said geo political uncertainty amid US withdrawal of Iran nuclear deal, uncertainty over outcome of unattended tariff, textile package and tax proposals in the federal budget, concerns for pending circular debt crises and uncertainty over privatization of ailing SOEs played a catalyst role in bearish close.