KARACHI: Despite positive opening, Pakistan Stock Exchange Tuesday closed in red zone as investors opted to book profits on available margins.

BRIndex100 lost 33.5 points or 0.63 percent to close at 5,252.90 points. BRIndex100 hit intraday high of 5,300.79 points and intraday low of 5,240.74 points. Volumes stood at 933.781 million shares.

BRIndex30 declined by 218.84 points or 0.79 percent to close at 27,479.66 points with a turnover of 744.525 million shares.

The KSE-100 Index decreased by 154.68 points or 0.32 percent to close at 48,147.98 points. Daily trading volumes on the ready counter once again crossed one billion mark to 1,040.523 million shares as compared to 936.088 million shares traded Monday.

Foreign investors also remained net sellers of shares worth $1.776 million. Total market capitalization declined by Rs 32 billion to Rs 8.360 trillion. Out of total 422 active scrips, 268 closed in negative and 139 in positive while the value of 15 stocks remained unchanged.

WorldCall Telecom was the volume leader with 399.964 million shares and gained Rs 0.14 to close at Rs 3.64 followed by Byco Petroleum that lost Rs 0.24 to close at Rs 11.25 with 37.801 million shares. Nestle Pakistan and Rafhan Maize were the top gainers increasing by Rs 69.52 and Rs 65.00 respectively to close at Rs 5776.19 and Rs 9790.00 while Unilever Foods and Wyeth Pak were the top losers declining by Rs 699.00 and Rs 182.57 respectively to close at Rs 16500.00 and Rs 2251.82.

BR Automobile Assembler Index decreased by 50.34 points or 0.51 percent to close at 9,772.00 points with total turnover of 5.905 million shares.

BR Cement Index lost 6.33 points or 0.08 percent to close at 7,736.14 points with 52.753 million shares.

BR Commercial Banks Index gained 11.77 points or 0.13 percent to close at 9,394.82 points with 33.980 million shares.

BR Power Generation and Distribution Index inched up by 36.48 points or 0.63 percent to close at 5,822.36 points with 61.133 million shares.

BR Oil and Gas Index closed at 4,144.98 points, down 35.15 points or 0.84 percent with 32.546 million shares.

BR Tech. & Comm. Index declined by 89.59 points or 2.03 percent to close at 4,333.47 points with 528.484 million shares.

“Despite starting on a positive note, the market soon slid into the negative territory and the KSE-100 index closed with a loss of 155 points at 48,148 level,” Maaz Mulla at JS Global Capital said.

The corona virus positivity ratio has dropped to 3.02 percent in Pakistan according to the National Command and Operation Centre (NCOC).

Selling pressure was witnessed in Refineries, Steel and Technology sector where BYCO (down 2.1 percent), ATRL (down 2.0 percent), NRL (down 1.4 percent), ISL (down 1.8 percent), ITTEFAQ (down 3.0 percent), AGHA (down 1.5 percent), ASTL (down 1.7 percent), HUMNL (down 3.0 percent), PTC (down 2.1 percent) and TRG (down 3.9 percent) closed lower.

Activity was seen in the Power sector where KAPCO (up 6.1 percent) and KEL (up 1.7 percent) closed higher.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2021