KARACHI: Pakistan Stock Exchange Wednesday witnessed a bullish trend on the back of healthy buying, mainly by local investors in almost all sectors.

The market opened on a positive note and remained in the green zone throughout the session.

The benchmark KSE-100 Index crossed 44,000 psychological level to hit 44,283.88 points intraday high, however failed to sustain this level due to profit-taking in certain stocks at the fag end and closed at 43,975.69 points with a net gain of 255.87 points or 0.59 percent.

Trading activity also improved as total daily volumes on ready counter increased to 236.506 million shares as compared to 189.041 million shares traded on Tuesday while total daily traded value increased to Rs 5.794 billion against previous day’s Rs 4.689 billion.

BRIndex100 gained 29.65 points or 0.68 percent to close at 4,391.40 points with total daily turnover of 185.193 million shares.

BRIndex30 increased by 169.22 points or 1.09 percent to close at 15,678.45 points with total daily trading volumes of 129.167 million shares.

Foreign investors however remained net sellers of shares worth $1.776 million. Total market capitalization increased by Rs 11 billion to Rs 7.438 trillion. Out of total 354 active scrips, 215 closed in positive and 115 in negative while the value of 24 stocks remained unchanged.

Flying Cement (R) was the volume leader with 22.346 million shares however lost Rs 0.05 to close at Rs 0.09 followed by WorldCall Telecom that closed at Rs 1.65, down Rs 0.03 with 19.694 million shares. Treet Corp gained Rs 0.30 to close at Rs 31.29 with 15.227 million shares.

Bata Pak and Mehmood Textile were the top gainers increasing by Rs 90.01 and Rs 59.34 respectively to close at Rs 2,268.00 and Rs 853.99 while Rafhan Maize and Wyeth Pak were the top losers declining by Rs 400.00 and Rs 120.88, respectively to close at Rs 11,400.00 and Rs 2,029.12.

An analyst at Arif Habib Limited said that green session was witnessed due to decline in international commodity prices. Cement sector stayed in the green zone due to major drop in international coal prices. Main board activity remained dull as investors remained cautious due to prevailing political noise. In the last trading hour, across the board buying was observed.

Sectors contributing to the performance include Technology (up 87.7 points), Cement (up 76.1 points), Banks (up 42.6 points), Textile Composite (up 18.5 points) and Power (up 18.1 points).

BR Automobile Assembler Index decreased by 57.13 points or 0.65 percent to close at 8,796.15 points with total turnover of 893,137 shares.

BR Cement Index surged by 109.79 points or 2.15 percent to close at 5,221.12 points with 25.917 million shares.

BR Commercial Banks Index gained 32.61 points or 0.33 percent to close at 9,867.41 points with 21.652 million shares.

BR Power Generation and Distribution Index added 50.21 points or 0.9 percent to close at 5,624.17 points with 8.575 million shares.

BR Oil and Gas Index closed at 3,868.17 points, up 0.74 points or 0.02 percent with 5.466 million shares.

BR Tech. & Comm. Index increased by 89.82 points or 2.6 percent to close at 3,549.61 points with 41.447 million shares.

Mubashir Anis Naviwala at JS Global Capital said that bulls made a comeback with the market marking an intraday high at the 44,281 level before eventually closing at 43,976, gaining 256 points.

Traded volume stood at 236 million shares where WTL (down 1.8 percent), TREET (up 1.0 percent), TPLP (up 3.8 percent), AGL (up 4.8 percent) and TELE (down 1.8 percent) cumulatively contributed 28 percent to the total volumes.

He said Cement Sector performance was noteworthy because of declining coal prices.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2022