KARACHI: Pakistan Stock Exchange witnessed a bullish session on the last trading day of the year on the back of aggressive buying in almost all sectors.

The benchmark KSE-100 Index surged by 673.09 points or 1.69 percent and crossed 40,000 psychological level to close at its intraday high of 40,420.45 points on Friday.

Trading activity also improved as daily volumes on ready counter increased to 284.512 million shares as compared to 227.788 million shares traded Thursday. The daily traded value increased to Rs 7.960 billion against previous Rs 7.037 billion.

BRIndex100 gained 70.9 points or 1.81 percent to close at 3,996.85 points with total daily turnover of 254.360 million shares.

BRIndex30 increased by 151.85 points or 1.09 percent to close at 14,037.33 points with total daily trading volumes of 164.664 million shares.

Foreign investors however remained on the selling side and withdrew $1.002 million from the local equity market. Total market capitalization increased by Rs 118 billion to Rs 6.500 trillion. Out of total 329 active scrips, 211 closed in positive and 105 in negative while the value of 13 stocks remained unchanged.

K-Electric was the volume leader with 69.807 million shares and gained Rs 0.21 to close at Rs 2.70 followed by PPL that surged by Rs 4.75 to close at Rs 68.14 with 11.900 million shares. WorldCall Telecom closed at Rs 1.17, up Rs 0.02 with 11.760 million shares.

Rafhan Maize and Pak Services were the top gainers increasing by Rs 605.35 and Rs 116.23 respectively to close at Rs 9100.00 and Rs 1666.21 while Premium Textile and Thal Ind. Corp were the top losers declining by Rs 41.05 and Rs 20.50 respectively to close at Rs 516.00 and Rs 263.00.

Muhammad Shuja Qureshi at JS Global Capital said that the KSE-100 Index gained 673 points to close at 40,420. PPL and OGDC led the market rally on the back of news on settlement of gas circular debt.

For the second consecutive day, steel stocks rose where notable gainers were ASL (up 7.8 percent), ISL (up 7.0 percent), and INIL (up 6.1 percent). On the other hand, tech stocks, barring SYS, were lackluster and ended the day in red.

Year-end buying activity generated a turnover of 204 million shares for the KSE-100 index. While the last trading session of the calendar year has ended on a positive note, future upside would depend on developments on the political and economic fronts.

BR Automobile Assembler Index gained 111.38 points or 1.49 percent to close at 7,591.96 points with total turnover of 3.961 million shares.

BR Cement Index inched up by 34.94 points or 0.9 percent to close at 3,931.26 points with 21.323 million shares.

BR Commercial Banks Index surged by 189.85 points or 2.44 percent to close at 7,984.20 points with 23.749 million shares.

BR Power Generation and Distribution Index added 100.21 points or 1.57 percent to close at 6,484.73 points with 81.228 million shares.

BR Oil and Gas Index increased by 89.8 points or 2.37 percent to close at 3,875.16 points with 32.277 million shares.

BR Tech. & Comm. Index closed at 4,245.80 points, up 21.81 points or 0.52 percent with 23.517 million shares.

Ahsan Mehanti at Arif Habib Corporation said that stocks closed higher in the year- end rally at PSX amid bull-run in global equities and ministry of finance assurance over ongoing virtual Pak-IMF bailout talks and $3.0 billion financial support to materialise from Saudi Arabia and China to avoid default.

He said Finance Minister directives to resolve Rs 1.5 trillion gas circular debt crises for economic growth and sustainability played a catalyst role in bullish activity at the year-end close session.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2022