The sentiment remained bearish on the Karachi share marker on Monday as the KSE-100 index declined by 95.94 points to close at 11,166.10 points with extremely low volume. After slightly positive opening the index hit 11,291.46 points intra-day high level, up 29.42 points. However, the investors opted for selling and the index dropped into negative zone at 11,137.75 points intra-day low level, down 124.29 points.
Foreign investors remained on the selling side and withdrew $0.83 million from the equity market. Trading remained very low due to limited participation of investors and the volume at ready counter declined to 25.904 million shares as compared to 53.866 million shares traded on last trading session. Market capitalisation declined by Rs 24 billion to Rs 2.976 trillion.
Of 287 active scrips, 126 closed in negative and 75 in positive, while the values of 86 stocks remained unchanged. Pakgen Power was the volume leader with 7.079 million shares and gained Re 0.62 to close at Rs 20.39. Nishat Mills lost Re 0.68 to close at Rs 42.64 with 1.210 million shares. NBP declined by Re 0.47 to close at Rs 45.56 with 1.159 million shares while NIB Bank closed at the previous session's closing level of Rs 1.39 with 0.863 million shares. Lotte Pakistan PTA decreased by Re 0.11 to close at Rs 10.68 with 1.029 million shares.
Fauji Fertiliser Co (FFC) and Fauji Fertiliser Bin Qasim declined by Rs 1.63 and Re 0.37 to close at Rs 153.55 and Rs 46.82 with 0.985 million shares and 0.674 million shares respectively. Jahangir Siddiqui Co lost Re 0.14 to close at Rs 5.92 with 0.820 million shares. PTCL gained Re 0.09 to close at Rs 11.51 with 0.684 million shares. TRG Pakistan inched up by Re 0.03 to close at Rs 1.98 with 0.616 million shares.
Rafhan Maize and National Refinery were highest gainers, increasing by Rs 57.22 and Rs 6.43 to close at Rs 2667.02 and Rs 360.51 respectively, while Unilever Pak and Nestle Pakistan were worst losers, declining by Rs 261.49 and Rs 192.33 to close at Rs 5365.00 and Rs 3654.30 respectively. Ahsan Mehanti at Arif Habib Investments said that the sentiment remained bearish at KSE with record low volumes in the earning announcement session.
He said that the investors remained concerned over volatile global capital and commodity prices after US economic slowdown and Europe debt crises. "The concerns over release of next IMF tranche for Pakistan economic support and uncertain Pak-US relations after China access to US copter played a catalyst role in bearish sentiment at KSE", he added.