KARACHI: A bullish trend continued on Pakistan Stock Exchange with high trading activity on the back of aggressive buying, mainly by local investors and institutions Wednesday.

BRIndex100 gained 54.99 points or 1.28 percent to close at 4,355.06 points. BRIndex100 hit intraday high of 4,368.44 and intraday low of 4,299.93 points. Volume stood at 765.962 million shares.

BRIndex30 increased by 297.85 points or 1.33 percent to close at 22,644.89 points with a turnover of 460.660 million shares.

The KSE-100 Index surged by 457.59 points or 1.11 percent and closed at 41,834.85 points. Trading activities improved significantly as daily volumes on ready counter increased to 837.022 million shares as compared to 759.360 million shares traded on Tuesday.

The foreign investors however remained net sellers of shares worth $2.988 million. Total market capitalization increased by Rs 91 billion to Rs 7.784 trillion. Out of total 425 active scrips, 281 closed in positive and 130 in negative while the value of 14 stocks remained unchanged.

K-Electric was the volume leader with 54.009 million shares and gained Rs 0.23 to close at Rs 4.30 followed by PTCL that inched up by Rs 0.88 to close at Rs 10.54 with 48.748 million shares. Nestle Pakistan and Rafhan Maize were the top gainers increasing by Rs 165.50 and Rs 49.00 respectively to close at Rs 6310.00 and Rs 8249.00 while Premier Sugar and Sapphire Fiber were the top losers declining by Rs 48.56 and Rs 40.00 respectively to close at Rs 598.93 and Rs 760.00.

BR Automobile Assembler Index gained 48.54 points or 0.61 percent to close at 8,020.70 points with total turnover of 8.582 million shares.

BR Cement Index inched up by 56.16 points or 0.98 percent to close at 5,784.16 points with 87.022 million shares.

BR Commercial Banks Index increased by 87.1 points or 1.04 percent to close at 8,423.78 points with 81.602 million shares.

BR Power Generation and Distribution Index closed at 5,291.95 points, up 12.17 points or 0.23 percent with 72.889 million shares.

BR Oil and Gas Index gained 44.02 points or 1.05 percent to close at 4,228.39 points with 70.227 million shares.

BR Tech. & Comm. Index surged by 52.18 points or 2.85 percent to close at 1,884.64 points with 114.488 million shares.

Ahsan Mehanti at Arif Habib Corporation said that bullish activity continued amid record trades led by scrips across the board as investor weigh easing CPI Inflation at 8.2 percent on YoY in August 2020 likely to affirm the SBP policy.

He said surging global crude oil prices, upbeat data for fertilizer sales up by 25 percent for July 2020, reports of MoUs over likely debt relief from Japan, likely favourable government negotiations on IPPs tariff and strong rupee recovery played a catalyst role in bullish close.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2020