KARACHI: Pakistan Stock Exchange witnessed bullish trend during the outgoing week ended on August 06, 2022 on the back of aggressive buying in almost all sectors on sharp appreciation of Pak Rupee against the US$, positive development on IMF front and improving political situation in the country. The benchmark KSE-100 index surged by 1,945.88 points on week-on-week basis and crossed 42,000 crucial level to close at 42,096.24 points.
Trading activities also improved significantly as average daily volumes on ready counter increased by 79.0 percent to 268.61 million shares as compared to previous week’s average of 150.08 million shares while average daily traded value on the ready counter increased by 53.2 percent to Rs 7.92 billion against previous week’s Rs 5.17 billion.
BRIndex100 gained 214.65 points during this week to close at 4,183.03 points with average daily turnover of 246.826 million shares.
BRIndex30 increased by 822.93 points on week-on-week basis to close at 15,432.70 points with average daily trading volumes of 185.123 million shares.
The foreign investors however remained net sellers of shares worth $689,533 during this week. Total market capitalization increased by Rs 276 billion to Rs 7.047 trillion.
“Bulls finally returned to the local market as the looming threat of a potential default on foreign debt eased off as a couple of friendly countries stepped forward to bail out Pakistan from the crisis situation”, an analyst at AKD Securities said.
The monthly external trade numbers were also announced this past week where the trade deficit pleasantly surprised consensus estimates owing to larger than anticipated squeeze on imports. Consequently, the KSE-100 gained 4.85 percent to close at 42,096points, amid significantly better volumes with average volume for the index recorded around 268.61million shares (up 78.9 percent), as better investment outlook lured the investors back.
Sector-wise, top performing sectors were Refineries (up 13.3 percent), auto assembles (up 12.4 percent), engineering (up 10.8 percent), cable and electrical goods (up 9.8 percent) and chemicals (up 8.9 percent), while the least favourite sectors were leasing (down 5.4 percent), close ended funds (down 3.7 percent), leathers and tanneries (down 3.7 percent), tobacco (down 1.3 percent) and sugar (down 1.3 percent).
Stock-wise, top performers in the KSE-100 were CHCC (up 24.5 percent), THALL (up 21.2 percent), MLCF (up 20.4 percent), COLG (up 19.8 percent) and HCAR (up 19.3 percent), while laggards were PGLC (down 16.2 percent), NCL (down 13.9 percent), HGFA (down 6.59 percent), FABL (down 3.8 percent) and FHAM (down 2.2 percent).
An analyst at JS Global Capital said that clarity on the political front, sharp appreciation of Pak Rupee against the US$, and positive development on the IMF front led the market rally this week. Key out performers during the week were Refinery (up 13 percent), Engineering (up 11 percent), Chemicals (up 9 percent) and Cements (up 8 percent).
The week started with the announcement of Election Commission’s verdict on the foreign funding case against PTI, which reduced political noise to a considerable extent. Moreover, Pak Rupee appreciated 6.7 percent against US$ reversing the recent trend of sharp depreciation. Along with this, IMF’s resident representative in Pakistan also affirmed that Pakistan has met all prior conditions for the combined 7th and 8th review of the IMF program.
The bond yields on Pakistan’s instruments also declined considerably this week, which added to the positive investor sentiments.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2022