KARACHI: Pakistan Stock Exchange remained under pressure during the outgoing week due to selling on investor concerns over prevailing political and economic situation in the country.

The benchmark KSE-100 index plunged by 754.40 points on week-on-week basis and closed below the psychological level of 42,000 at 41,487.58 points.

Trading activities also remained thin as average daily volumes on ready counter decreased by 43.4 percent to 133.52 million shares as compared to previous week’s average of 235.82 million shares while average daily traded value on ready counter declined by 49.0 percent to Rs 4.04 billion against previous week’s Rs 7.93 billion.

BRIndex100 decreased by 98.89 points during this week to close at 4,194.99 points with average daily turnover of 116.080 million shares.

BRIndex30 declined by 540.42 points on week-on-week basis to close at 14,521.18 points with average daily trading volumes of 80.026 million shares.

Total market capitalization declined by Rs 144 billion during this week to stand at Rs 6.212 trillion.

“In a week mired with political uncertainty, the country presently needs additional financing for the successful completion of long standing 9th IMF review whereas Pakistan has assured the IMF it will not implement cross fuel subsidy programme”, an analyst at AKD Securities said.

Furthermore, SBP FX reserves fell by $74million to $4.38billion as at 05 May 2023, with the import cover still remaining below a month.

Sector-wise, the top performing sectors were Close- End Mutual fund (up 3.4 percent), Textile Composite (up 2.5 percent) and Textile Weaving (up 1.6 percent), while the least favourite sectors were Vanaspati & Allied Industries (down 7.3 percent), Oil & Gas Exploration companies (down 5.6 percent) and Modarabas (down 4.8 percent).

Stock-wise, top performers were GLAXO (up 7.1 percent), SCBPL (up 5.9 percent), MUREB (up 5.0 percent), PIOC (up 4.4 percent) and ATLH (up 2.5 percent), while laggards were PSEL (down 7.3 percent), OGDC (down 7.3 percent), PPL (down 6.6 percent), SRVI (down 6.5 percent) and HCAR (down 6.4 percent).

Flow wise, individuals were the major buyers with net buy of $1.07million, followed by Broker Propriety Trading (net buy of $0.85million), while foreign investors were major sellers during the week, with a net sell of $1.14million.

In a turnabout from previous trend, market closed negative this week, losing a total of 754 points over rising political temperature and delay in completion of IMF’s ninth review, an analyst at JS Global Capital said.

Investors chose to stay on the sidelines as a result of the former premier’s arrest and the subsequent nation-wide violent protests.

Sector-wise, the E&P (down 6.0 percent) and Tech (down 3.5 percent) sectors stood out as key under performers.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2023