The Karachi share market witnessed mixed trend during the week ended on January 29, 2011. Foreign investors' support continued with an inflow of $6.3 million, while local investors opted for profit taking before announcement of monetary policy.
The KSE-100 index managed to gain 30.79 points and closed at the level of 12,462.70 points. The investors' participation remained very low as the average daily volume at ready counter drastically declined by 50 percent to 117 million shares. Market capitalisation, however, increased by Rs 6 billion to Rs 3.369 trillion.
On Monday, the market opened under pressure and the index lost 61.32 points to close at 12,370.59 points with the volume of 109.265 million shares.
On Tuesday, investors' interest revived and the index recovered 85.16 points to close at 12,455.75 points with 137.378 million shares.
On Wednesday, the index gained 27.59 points to close at 12,483.34 points with 139.314 million shares. On Thursday, local investors opted for profit taking and the index, after moving both sides, closed at 12,477.00 points with a loss of 6.34 points, with 112.373 million shares.
On Friday, the index declined by 14.30 points to close at 12,462.70 points with 87.909 million shares.
Asad Siddiqui, analyst at Invest Capital and Securities, said that the market started the week under pressure and the index discounted itself by 61 points, plunging to 12,371 points. However, from the very next day, positive movement was seen, but the index remained range-bound between 12,446 and 12,483 points. The market's revival, witnessed on Tuesday and Wednesday, was fuelled by the expectation investors had from the upcoming results' season. Onwards, the index kept flirting with the psychological barrier of 12,500 points, but lacking the zeal to surpass it, and closed for the week at 12,463 points, recording a tiny 30 points increase.
Sana Hanif at JS Global Capital said that all eyes were on the monetary policy announcement where expectations of another 50bps hike in the policy rate led the investors to book profits during the week. Result season kicked off this week with the earnings announcements of PPL, FFC, FFBL LOTPTA, NRL, ATRL, APL and POL which were largely in line or above market expectations.
During the outgoing week, all key sectors including banks, oil and gas and telecom ended as underperformers. Autos too remained under pressure post Federal Cabinet's approval of increasing the age limit of imported cars up to 5 years. Moreover, despite healthy results reported by two leading fertiliser makers and rise in DAP prices by Rs 100 per bag announced by Engro, investors chose to book profits in key fertiliser stocks.