KARACHI: Pakistan Stock Exchange Thursday remained rangebound throughout the day and closed in negative territory as investors opted to book for profits.

The market opened on a positive note, however failed to sustain this momentum due to heavy selling in various sectors. The benchmark KSE-100 Index hit 43,875.72 points intraday high and 43,390.96 points intraday low before closing at 43,481.50 points, down 195.06 points or 0.45 percent.

Trading activity further improved as daily volumes on the ready counter increased to 621.216 million shares as compared to 607.995 million shares traded on Wednesday however daily traded value on the ready counter declined to Rs 10.496 billion against previous day’s Rs 11.129 billion.

BRIndex100 lost 24.12 points or 0.55 percent to close at 4,358.03 points with total daily turnover of 581.680 million shares.

BRIndex30 decreased by 106.83 points or 0.66 percent to close at 15,996.41 points with total daily trading volumes of 468.924 million shares.

Foreign investors however remained net buyers of shares worth $95,066. Total market capitalization declined by Rs 35 billion to Rs 7.234 trillion. Out of total 347 active scrips, 200 closed in negative and 128 in positive while the value of 19 stocks remained unchanged.

WorldCall Telecom was the volume leader with 170.780 million shares and gained Rs 0.14 to close at Rs 1.44 followed by Cnergyico PK that inched up by Rs 0.18 to close at Rs 5.85 with 62.882 million shares. K-Electric lost Rs 0.26 to close at Rs 3.47 with 58.046 million shares.

Bata Pak and Gatron Industries were the top gainers increasing by Rs 54.89 and Rs 26.58 respectively to close at Rs 2,000.00 and Rs 381.35 while Rafhan Maize and Sanofi-Aventis were the top losers declining by Rs 539.99 and Rs 79.00 respectively to close at Rs 9,660.01 and Rs 1,461.00.

An analyst at Arif Habib Limited said that the market remained rangebound throughout the day as investors opted for profit taking. The benchmark KSE-100 Index opened in the green zone but profit-taking was witnessed by the market participants that pulled the index down to 286 points. Refinery and cement sector remained in the limelight.

Sectors contributing to the performance include Technology (down 59.2 points), Fertilizer (down 33.3 points), E&P (down 27.0 points), Power (down 21.8 points) and Engineering (down 18.8 points).

BR Automobile Assembler Index gained 7.34 points or 0.08 percent to close at 9,719.36 points with total turnover of 1.596 million shares.

BR Cement Index lost 8.52 points or 0.19 percent to close at 4,476.52 points with 18.891 million shares.

BR Commercial Banks Index inched down by 4.6 points or 0.05 percent to close at 9,245.47 points with 25.377 million shares.

BR Power Generation and Distribution Index declined by 61.24 points or 1.0 percent to close at 6,065.53 points with 70.405 million shares.

BR Oil and Gas Index decreased by 21.86 points or 0.54 percent to close at 4,022.92 points with 27.162 million shares.

BR Tech. & Comm. Index closed at 3,790.28 points, down 57.74 points or 1.5 percent with 202.714 million shares.

An analyst at Topline Securities said that Pakistan equities closed negative where benchmark KSE-100 Index settled at 43,481 level, down 0.45 percent.

The day kicked off on a positive note where the KSE-100 Index made an intraday high of plus 202 points however this positivity didn’t sustain at the bourse as market witnessed some profit taking which led the market to make an intraday low of minus 286 points.

Major negative contributors in the trading session were SYS, UBL, PPL, KEL, and OGDC cumulatively dented the Index by 122 points.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2022