Bears took complete hold of the share market on Monday and the KSE-100 Index plummeted by 275.21 points to close at 10430.66 on the back of the news that the long-awaited forensic investigation report regarding KSE March 2005 crisis would be presented to the National Assembly standing committee on Tuesday, and various rumours regarding price of OGDCL GDRs.
The KSE-30 index also shed 222.31 points and closed at 12997.68 points level. The start of the market was negative and the bears gradually strengthened their grip to mark the 10421.74 points intra-day low. Trading activity remained dull and the ready market volume shrank to 116.650 million shares, against 231.025 million shares traded on last Friday. Market capitalisation also declined by Rs 51 billion to Rs 2.902 trillion.
In the broader market, losers outnumbered gainers as of total 352 traded scrips 218 closed in the negative, 103 companies close in the green, and 31 companies remained unchanged. Overall sentiment was negative as investors' confidence seemed to be badly shattered.
Asad Abdul Razzak, analyst at Live Securities, said that index heavyweight OGDCL depicted 3.7 percent decline to close at Rs 125.25. Selling came from all corners as weak holders and speculative investors continued to liquidate their long positions. MCB, NBP, PTCL, POL and PPL posted respective declines of 3.9 percent, 1.9 percent, 1.6 percent, 2.9 percent and 2.1 percent closing at Rs 244.20, Rs 258.00, Rs 46.30, Rs 337.55 and Rs 233.00.
Cement sector continued its declining trend as Lucky Cement, D G Khan Cement and Fauji Cement depicted 3.7 percent, 3.8 percent and 2.0 percent declines, respectively. However, some spark was seen in PSO as the scrip gained 0.8 percent, to close at Rs 290.90.
The market opened on a negative note and hit remained in negative territory for whole trading time. Tariq Hussain Khan, analyst at Atlas Capital Market, said that downward trend was witnessed across the board as investors feared that presentation of forensic report on Tuesday would bring more negative sentiment to the market.
CCBL performed exceptionally well and managed to close with a positive change, remaining volume leader with 17.129 million shares on the back of pledging of Rs 6 billion investment by Saudi group 'Samba'.
Other scrips that closed at their upper circuits were ACBL, CTTL and JOVC. OGDC shed Rs 4.85 contributing 83 points towards index decline. Most of the leading banking scrips namely NBP and MCB also closed in red down by Rs 5 and Rs 9.80 respectively.