KARACHI: Pakistan Stock Exchange on Monday witnessed a bullish trend and closed on strong positive note with healthy gains on the back of continuous buying, mainly by local investors coupled with institutional support.
The benchmark KSE-100 Index surged by 338.96 points or 0.67 percent and after over six years (May 2017) crossed 51,000 psychological level to close at 51,070.83 points. The index hit 51,419.87 points intraday high, however closed at slightly low level due to profit-taking in some stocks.
Trading activity, however, remained low as the daily volumes on ready counter declined to 364.070 million shares as compared to 430.052 million shares traded last Friday. The daily traded value on ready counter increased to Rs 15.930 billion against previous session’s Rs 14.611 billion.
BRIndex100 added 32.23 points or 0.62 percent to close at 5,192.27 points with total daily turnover of 333.469 million shares.
BRIndex30 increased by 162.75 points or 0.89 percent to close at 18,359.24 points with daily trading volumes of 201.916 million shares.
Foreign investors however remained net sellers of shares worth $771,426. The market capitalization increased by Rs 54 billion to Rs 7.433 trillion. Out of total 352 active scrips, 171 closed in positive and 150 in negative while the value of 31 stocks remained unchanged.
OGDC was the volume leader with 27.498 million shares and surged by Rs 5.36 to close at Rs 102.45 followed by PPL that increased by Rs 2.66 to close at Rs 85.22 with 24.259 million shares. Fauji Foods gained Rs 0.08 to close at Rs 6.73 with 19.278 million shares.
Rafhan Maize and Sanofi-Aventis were the top gainers increasing by Rs 107.50 and Rs 52.50 respectively to close at Rs 8100.00 and Rs 752.50 while Philip Morris Pak and Faisal Spinning were the top losers declining by Rs 39.60 and Rs 26.62 respectively to close at Rs 531.40 and Rs 328.38.
An analyst at Topline Securities said that Pakistan’s equities observed a strong upward trend, registering a 0.67 percent increase to conclude the trading session at 51,070 level. This gain of 339 points was primarily influenced by the current optimistic market sentiment.
The Oil & Gas, Fertilizer, and automobile sectors, with key players like PPL, OGDC, FFC, EFERT, and THALL, contributed positively by adding 275 points to the market’s performance. In contrast, UNITY, ENGRO, and SYS collectively incurred a loss of 57 points.
BR Automobile Assembler Index increased by 93.29 points or 0.92 percent to close at 10,192.38 points with total turnover of 9.119 million shares.
BR Cement Index inched up by 11.55 points or 0.22 percent to close at 5,316.36 points with 20.222 million shares.
BR Commercial Banks Index lost 3.27 points or 0.03 percent to close at 11,882.96 points with 18.138 million shares.
BR Power Generation and Distribution Index gained 29.95 points or 0.28 percent to close at 10,868.91 points with 30.528 million shares.
BR Oil and Gas Index surged by 123.19 points or 2.63 percent to close at 4,807.11 points with 83.503 million shares.
BR Tech. & Comm. Index closed at 3,658.87 points, down 14.65 points or 0.4 percent with 35.888 million shares.
Muhammad Shuja Qureshi at JS Global Capital said that the KSE-100 Index gained 339 points to close at 51,071 level. Energy sector led the rally on back of the news that ECC could ratify the proposed increase in gas prices.
Trading volumes clocked in at 363 million shares, where OGDC (up 5.5 percent), PPL (up 3.2 percent), FFL (up 1.2 percent), KEL (up 0.9 percent), and ASC (down 10 percent) were the volume leaders.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2023