The weighted average CFS rate at KSE stood at 16.8 percent on last Friday (November 11), which was a marginal rise from 16.6 percent rate seen as some of the investors built long positions in blue chips and investment stocks.
The interbank money market continued to remain tight last week, which played its role in not enabling CFS rates to fall. Total CFS investment at KSE remained glued to the Rs 25 billion mark, as in a scenario of rising equity prices it pretty much had nowhere to go.
The weighted average CFS rate at LSE stood at 21.3 percent last Friday, with the investment level at its highest possible level of Rs 2.3 billion.
The open interest in November stock futures depicted a rising trend, when compared with the situation at the weekend of the Eid holidays. Open interest in stock futures at KSE rose to Rs 10.7 bn as against Rs 9.4 bn seen on November 2. This increase was in line with the overall rise in equity prices as depicted by the KSE-100 Index.
The stock futures spread fell dramatically on weekend-to-weekend basis, declining to 11.2 percent last Friday as against 18.7 percent seen on November 2, ie before the Eid holidays.
The next two weeks are expected to be critical for the stock futures, as the third and fourth weeks in stock futures contracts'' life span are usually a bit jittery.
Corporate results season is over for now. However, some investors are still looking for taking advantage of the tremendous results announced by the banking and cement sectors. The issue in complete focus now is PTCL privatisation, which continues to get delayed with each passing day. The absence of any concrete news flow has caused speculative rumours galore at the bourses. Any announcement in this regard is likely to provide the stimulus for the near-term direction of the KSE-100 Index.