KARACHI: Bullish trend in two trading sessions during the outgoing week ended on November 19 supported the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) to close on positive note on week-on-week basis. KSE-100 index increased by 740.26 points on week-on-week basis and closed at 46,489.41 points. Trading activities however remained low as average daily volumes on ready counter decreased by 22.7 percent to 244.46 million shares as compared to previous week’s average of 316.38 million shares. Average daily traded value on ready counter declined by 15.9 percent and stood at Rs 9.23 billion.
BRIndex100 gained 60.99 points on week-on-week basis to close at 4,787.51 points with average daily trading volumes of 179.400 million shares.
BRIndex30 however closed at 19,995.52 points, down 648.85 points on wee-on-week basis with average daily turnover of 112.830 million shares.
The foreign investors however remained on the selling side and withdrew $24.9 million from local capital market during this week. Total market capitalization increased by Rs 126 billion to Rs 7.944 trillion.
An analyst at AKS Securities said that positive news-flow regarding the revival of IMF program kept the sentiments buoyant and the index gained 1.62 percent on week-on-week basis to close in at 46,489 level.
During the week, the sitting government successfully passed the SBP autonomy bill which was one of the requirements by IMF. This news received a warm reception from the investor community and the index rallied by 700 points in the immediate aftermath. Consequently, the market has yielded 2.0 percent since the start of FY22 after this week’s positive performance. However, the week’s positive performance was achieved amid considerably lower market participation which remained dull throughout the week.
Also, after the close of the last trading session of the week, SBP announced its MPS decision where the benchmark interest rates were increased by 150bps as against our and street consensus of 100bps.
Flow wise, Insurance companies remained the major buyers with (net buy of $13.5 million) followed by Companies (net buy of $7.7 million) while Foreigners stood on the other side with (net sell of $24.9 million) followed by Banks (net sell of $3.5 million).
Stock wise, major performers were SFL (up 37 percent), FATIMA (up 11.4 percent), KAPCO (up 9.1 percent), SHFA (up 8.5 percent) and MLCF (up 8.1 percent), while laggards were MUREB (down 7.1 percent), PSX (down 8.3 percent), UNITY (down 9.1 percent), GATI (down 14.8 percent) and TRG (down 16.7 percent).
An analyst at JS Global Capital said that the KSE-100 Index closed up 1.6 percent on week-on-week basis on the back of two bullish trading sessions from the whole week. Anticipation of a higher quantum of hike in Policy Rate to be announced in pre-poned Monetary Policy meeting drove the Banking sector this week (up 3.5 percent on WoW). After trading hours of the last session, the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) announced a hike of 150bps, taking the Policy Rate to 8.75 percent.
Moreover, approval of the second installment of the hefty one-time payments to 20 IPPs broadly gave the energy sectors a boost. While the Power sector increased 1.2 percent on WoW, the Oil and Gas Exploration Companies registered an outperformance of 1.8 percent. Resultantly, Kot Addu Power Company (KAPCO, up 9.1 percent on WoW) was also among the top performers of the week.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2021