KARACHI: Pakistan Stock Exchange Monday witnessed a bearish trend and closed in deep red due to heavy selling in almost all sectors. BRIndex100 decreased by 98.48 points or 2.08 percent to close at 4,628.46 points. BRIndex100 hit intraday high of 4,741.89 and intraday low of 4,618.42 points. Volumes stood at 256.382 million shares.

BRIndex30 declined by 697.2 points or 2.86 percent to close at 23,682.07 points with a turnover of 170.322 million shares.

The KSE-100 Index plunged by 752.74 points or 1.70 percent to close at 43,548.21 points. Daily trading volumes on ready counter however increased to 302.803 million shares as compared to 266.848 million shares traded last Friday.

Foreign investors however remained net buyers of shares worth $627,377. The market capitalization declined by Rs 134 billion to Rs 7.700 trillion. Out of total 391 active scrips, 322 closed in negative and only 61 in positive while the value of 8 stocks remained unchanged.

TRG Pak was the volume leader with 24.561 million shares however declined by Rs 8.74 to close at Rs 127.48 followed by Dost Steels that gained Rs 0.72 to close at Rs 5.88 with 24.402 million shares. Sapphire Textile and Sapphire Fiber were the top gainers increasing by Rs 64.60 and Rs 54.00 respectively to close at Rs 925.97 and Rs 855.00 while Rafhan Maize and Colgate Palmolive were the top losers declining by Rs 700.00 and Rs 97.99 respectively to close at Rs 9500.00 and Rs 2750.01.

BR Automobile Assembler Index declined by 100.99 points or 1.13 percent to close at 8,852.27 points with total turnover of 3.571 million shares.

BR Cement Index plunged by 117.72 points or 1.7 percent to close at 6,805.85 points with 14.437 million shares. BR Commercial Banks Index decreased by 117.66 points or 1.38 percent to close at 8,432.18 points with 30.133 million shares. BR Power Generation and Distribution Index lost 42.71 points or 0.77 percent to close at 5,471.98 points with 10.402 million shares.

BR Oil and Gas Index fell by 61.11 points or 1.55 percent to close at 3,887.98 points with 12.694 million shares.

BR Tech. & Comm. Index closed at 3,281.12 points, down 201.2 points or 5.78 percent with 53.218 million shares.

Danish Ladhani at JS Global Capital said that the KSE-100 Index closed down 753 points at 43,548 level after making a high and a low of plus 130 points and minus 830 points during the session.

Total volume traded for the day was recorded at 303 million shares where top contributors were TRG (down 6.4 percent), DSL (up 14 percent), SILK (up 9.6 percent), BYCO (down 3.1 percent) and PRL (down 7.5 percent).

Financials, Technology and Refineries were the major laggards where ATRL (down 7.5 percent), PRL (down 7.5 percent) and NRL (down 7.5 percent), NETSOL (down 7.5 percent) and AVN (down 7.5 percent) closed at their respective lower circuits. Pressure was seen in the market as investors remained skeptical on the political front and the soaring Covid-19 cases. Furthermore, Pakistan's trade deficit widened by a massive 118 percent on year-on-year basis to $3.3 billion in March 2021 compared to $1.5 billion in March 2020.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2021