A bullish trend was witnessed on Karachi share market on Tuesday on the back of investors' interest mainly in fertiliser, banking and oil sector stocks. The KSE-100 index surged by 192.51 points and closed at the level of 11,305.16 points. The market opened on a positive note and the index hit 11,328.12 points intra-day high level. The index remained positive throughout the session.
Trading activities also improved, as the daily volumes at ready counter increased to 53.112 million shares, as compared to 26.681 million shares traded on Monday. Total market capitalisation increased by Rs 48 billion to Rs 2.938 trillion. Of the total 321 active stocks, 141 closed in positive and 90 in negative, while the value of 90 stocks remained unchanged.
Fertiliser sector led the rally, as Engro Corp being the volume leader surged by Rs 4.56 to close at Rs 100.45 with 5.977 million shares. In the other fertiliser sector stocks, Fauji Fertiliser Bin Qasim, Fatima Fertiliser and Fauji Fertiliser Co increased by Re 0.52, Re 0.27 and Re 0.86 to close at Rs 44.57, Rs 23.22 and Rs 166.03 with 3.739 million shares, 3.676 million shares and 1.838 million shares, respectively. Lotte Pakistan PTA inched up by Re 0.25 to close at Rs 10.02 with 5.036 million shares.
In the banking sector, SilkBank lost Re 0.04 to close at Rs 1.63 with 4.654 million shares, while NBP gained Re 0.31 to close at Rs 42.50 with 2.863 million shares. Jahangir Siddiqui Co inched up by Re 0.17 to close at Rs 4.46 with 3.215 million shares. Hub Power Co increased by Re 0.20 to close at Rs 33.89 with 2.010 million shares.
Fresh buying was also seen in the heavyweight E&P sector stocks, as OGDC surged by Rs 4.25 to close at Rs 144.43 with 1.819 million shares. Nestle Pakistan and Rafhan Maize were the highest gainers increasing by Rs 138.80 and Rs 110.60 to close at Rs 2938.84 and Rs 2613.27, respectively while Shell Pakistan and Gillette Pak were the worst losers declining by Rs 2.98 and Rs 1.99 to close at Rs 196.00 and Rs 37.83, respectively.
Hasnain Asghar Ali at Aziz Fidahusein Co said that the foreign inflow, although negligible in comparison to outflow reported in recent period, did allow the syndicate of local participants to continue an aggressive stance, wherein OGDC and Nestle on low trade clearly led the triple digit gain attained during initial trade, the stocks more then 50 percent to the overall gains at market close.
He said that the fertiliser sector stocks led the turnover wherein couple of stocks sustaining consistent dividend and year-on-year growth track invited placements, while some witnessed volumetric hand shift mainly on group support, high priced stocks from wide spread sectors wherein sellers stayed on the back foot due to gains on the index did display low volume strength, the proposed increase in tax rate on banks by FBR disallowed the sector to join the low volume activity, so did the cement sector on unconfirmed news of raids conducted in order to establish cartelization stayed under selling pressure, nevertheless the targeted activity by the syndicate disallowed panic to set in and the index firmly stood in positive zone.