KARACHI: Pakistan Stock Exchange Monday remained under pressure and closed on a negative note due to selling in various sectors. BRIndex100 lost 19.39 points or 0.39 percent to close at 4,988.84 points. BRIndex100 hit intraday high of 5,026.39 and intraday low of 4,974.64 points. Volumes stood at 385.245 million shares.

BRIndex30 closed at 25,711.40, up 36.48 points or 0.14 percent with a turnover of 253.433 million shares.

The KSE-100 Index declined by 183.92 points or 0.39 percent to close at 46,721.87 points. Daily trading volumes on the ready counter stood at 428.626 million shares as compared to 440.278 million shares traded on previous session.

Foreign investors also remained net sellers of shares worth $1.364 million. The market capitalization declined by Rs 46 billion to Rs 8.434 trillion. Out of total 419 active scrips, 242 closed in negative and 158 in positive while the value of 19 stocks remained unchanged.

WorldCall Telecom was the volume leader with 52.912 million shares and gained Rs 0.09 to close at Rs 1.23 followed by Telecard Limited that increased by Rs 1.00 to close at Rs 4.89 with 35.630 million shares. Bhanero Textile and Sapphire Textile were the top gainers increasing by Rs 61.95 and Rs 43.59 respectively to close at Rs 887.96 and Rs 1043.59 while Rafhan Maize and Colgate Palmolive were the top losers declining by Rs 93.44 and Rs 86.56 respectively to close at Rs 10796.56 and Rs 2893.33.

BR Automobile Assembler Index lost 29.28 points or 0.33 percent to close at 8,745.91 points with total turnover of 9.431 million shares.

BR Cement Index declined by 78.5 points or 1.15 percent to close at 6,723.12 points with 17.881 million shares.

BR Commercial Banks Index decreased by 46.96 points or 0.5 percent to close at 9,310.45 points with 24.105 million shares.

BR Power Generation and Distribution Index closed at 6,078.26 points, down 21.06 points or 0.35 percent with 18.286 million shares.

BR Oil and Gas Index gained 17.87 points or 0.41 percent to close at 4,379.83 points with 38.405 million shares.

BR Tech. & Comm. Index increased by 140.2 points or 4.31 percent to close at 3,391.60 points with 153.635 million shares.

An analyst at Arif Habib Limited said that the market saw selling pressure at the beginning of the week, which was also observed in the last trading session when the Index crossing 47,000 level. Profit booking was observed across the board, especially in Banks, E&P, Cement and Fertilizer sectors that kept any increase in index in check.

The Index swayed positively by 168 points earlier in the session, however, ended the session – negative 184 points.

Conclusion of IPPs agreeing with the government on power tariff as well resolution of circular debt helped Power,

Refinery and O&GMCs sectors to contribute positively to the Index. Similarly, Tech stocks performed well today with TRG closing upper circuit.

Sectors contributing to the performance include Fertilizer (down 101 points), Cement (down 53 points), Banks (down 53 points), Chemical (down 27 points) and Inv. Banks (down 22 points).

Stocks that contributed positively to the index include TRG (up 91 points), POL (up 29 points), MARI (up 16 points), SYS (up 9 points) and OGDC (up 8 points). Stocks that contributed negatively include ENGRO (down 44 points), FFC (down 26 points), HBL (down 22 points), DAWH (down 20 points) and EFERT (down 19 points).

Copyright Business Recorder, 2021