KARACHI: Pakistan Stock Exchange Wednesday witnessed a historic day with highest-ever single day trading volume in its history and closed on strong positive note on the back of aggressive buying, mainly by local investors and institutions.

BRIndex100 gained 75.27 points or 1.5 percent to close at 5,084.16 points. BRIndex100 hit intraday high of 5,089.87 points and an intraday low of 5,019.68 points. Total volumes stood at 1,450.651 million shares.

BRIndex30 increased by 545.41 points or 2.1 percent to close at 26,491.54 points with total daily turnover of 1,131.432 million shares.

The KSE-100 Index surged by 511.65 points or 1.11 percent and closed at 46,812.31 points.

Foreign investors however remained net sellers of shares worth $3.132 million.

Trading activity improved significantly as the Pakistan Stock Exchange witnessed highest-ever trading volumes in its history. Total traded volumes on the ready counter surged to all-time high level of 1,563.360 million shares, 84 percent up as compared to 677.381 million shares traded on Tuesday. Almost half or 49 percent of the volumes were driven by penny stocks, ie, WorldCall Telecom.

The market capitalization increased by Rs 85 billion to Rs 8.097 trillion. Out of total 423 active scrips, 284 closed in positive and 125 in negative while the value of 14 stocks remained unchanged.

WorldCall Telecom was the volume leader with 707.728 million shares and gained Rs 0.94 to close at Rs 3.22 followed by Hum Network that increased by Rs 1.00 to close at Rs 7.81 with 112.493 million shares. Unilever Foods and Wyeth Pak were the top gainers increasing by Rs 927.04 and Rs 138.26 respectively to close at Rs 16599.00 and Rs 1981.84 while Rafhan Maize and Mehmood Textile were the top losers declining by Rs 150.00 and Rs 20.00 respectively to close at Rs 9350.00 and Rs 400.00.

BR Automobile Assembler Index increased by 96.19 points or 1.04 percent to close at 9,304.53 points with total turnover of 8.291 million shares.

BR Cement Index lost 2.15 points or 0.03 percent to close at 7,470.38 points with 39.919 million shares.

BR Commercial Banks Index surged by 134.07 points or 1.47 percent to close at 9,237.27 points with 44.325 million shares.

BR Power Generation and Distribution Index gained 62.72 points or 1.15 percent to close at 5,531.64 points with 34.508 million shares.

BR Oil and Gas Index inched up by 52.67 points or 1.34 percent to close at 3,974.94 points with 36.401 million shares.

BR Tech. & Comm. Index closed at 4,249.89 points, up 193.53 points or 4.77 percent with 938.889 million shares.

“Historic day at PSX that saw highest-ever trading volume of 1.560 billion shares, courtesy WTL which realized trading volume of 706.5 million shares,” an analyst at Arif Habib Limited said.

Though E&P and Banking sector stocks helped the index maintain the momentum, the real head turners were the Technology and Telecommunication sectors where listed scrips of IT and Media made the sentiment. WTL, HUMNL, MDTL, PTC, TELE, AVN and UNITY remained in the limelight.

Among scrips, WTL led the table with 706.5 million shares, followed by HUMNL (112.3 million shares) and UNITY (45.1 million shares).

Sectors contributing to the performance include Banks (up 147 points), Technology (up 99 points), E&P (up 73 points), Textile (up 46 points) and Power (up 28 points).

Stocks that contributed positively to the index include TRG (up 72 points), OGDC (up 45 points), PPL (up 30 points), MCB (up 29 points) and BAFL (up 28 points). Stocks that contributed negatively include FFC (down 22 points), FCCL (down 9 points), MLCF (down 8 points), EPCL (down 5 points) and PAKT (down 4 points).

Copyright Business Recorder, 2021