Bullish sentiments prevailed on the Lahore Stock Exchange on Thursday and the equities registered gains amid slightly decreased trading turnover. The LSE-25 index gained 24.66 points and was closed at 4143.35 against 4118.69 of Wednesday, while transaction volume was declined to 3.465 million shares as compared to 3.651 million shares traded a day earlier.
The market was opened on a positive sign and stayed in green zone most of the day, as investors kept on making entries in select shares. However, just before the close of trading, investors preferred to secure their positions and offloaded what they picked earlier that pushed down the index from the day's peak level of 4,171 to 4143.35.
Thal Limited, DG Khan Cement, Lafarge Pakistan Cement, NetSol Technologies, Nishat Mills, Hira Textile Mills, Fauji Fertiliser, Fauji Fertiliser Bin Qasim, Dewan Farooq Motors and Dewan Salman Fibre helped index improvement. Profit taking was also seen in some bluechips like Adamjee Insurance, Engro Corporation, Dawood Hercules Corporation, PPL, Arif Habib Corporation, Hub Power, Bank Alfalah, Askari Bank, National Bank, Bank of Punjab and Engro Foods.
The losers were marginally ahead of the gainers, as out of a total of 87 active issues, 21 companies registered gains, 24 recorded losses while 42 companies stayed glued to their previous closing. Thal Limited gained Rs 3.29, DG Khan Cement was improved by Rs 1.25 while NetSol Technologies was up by Re 1. In the minus column, Engro Foods lost Rs 2.40, Adamjee Insurance was declined by 55-paisa while Engro Corporation and Arif Habib Corporation were down by 53-paisa and 50-paisa respectively. Lafarge Pakistan Cement with trading of 971,000 shares topped the volume leaders followed by Dewan Salman Fibre with 573,000 shares.