Pakistan Stock Exchange Thursday witnessed a bearish trend due to selling in various sectors. BRIndex100 lost 2.74 points or 0.06 percent to close at 4,315.39 points. BRIndex100 touched intraday high of 4,327.81 and intraday low of 4,289.41 points. Volumes stood at 109.040 million shares. BRIndex30 decreased by 20.66 points or 0.09 percent to close at 22,874.48 points with a turnover of 81.105 million shares.
The KSE-100 index declined by 37.13 points or 0.09 percent to close at 40,506.98 points. Trading activity remained thin as daily volumes decreased to 123.619 million shares as compared to 160.241 million shares traded Wednesday. Foreign investors however remained net buyers of shares worth $2.6 million. The market capitalization declined by Rs 15 to close at Rs 8.039 trillion. Out of total 339 active scrips, 183 closed in negative, 138 in positive while the value of 18 stocks remained unchanged.
Lotte Chemical was the volume leader with 25.633 million shares. However, it lost Re 0.33 to close at Rs 16.65 followed by D. G. Khan Cement that declined by Rs 4.59 to close at Rs 96.23 with 8.779 million shares. Rafhan Maize and Colgate Palmolive were the top gainers with Rs 100.00 and Rs 81.50, respectively to close at Rs 7,300.00 and Rs 2,040.00. Pak Tobacco and Service Ind. Limited were the top losers with Rs 56.98 and Rs 31.00, respectively to close at Rs 2,400.00 and Rs 770.00.
BR Commercial Banks Index gained 27.39 points or 0.32 percent to close at 8,647.20 points with a turnover of 12.975 million shares. BR Cement Index declined by 102.96 points or 2.27 percent to close at 4,423.60 points with 23.425 million shares. BR Oil and Gas Index inched up by 6.61 points or 0.13 percent to close at 4,958.26 points with 4.774 million shares.
BR Tech. & Comm. Index closed at 1,028.46 points, down 0.75 points or 0.07 percent with 5.611 million shares. BR Power Generation and Distribution Index decreased by 29.21 points or 0.46 percent with 7.532 million shares. Danish Ladhani at JS Global Capital said that the Pakistan equities closed negative with the KSE-100 Index losing 37 points, closing at 40,507 levels, down 0.1 percent. The local bourse made a high and a low of plus 45 and down 226 points, respectively.
Cement was the major sector that dragged the market down where DGKC (down 4.6 percent), LUCK (down 1.2 percent) and FCCL (down 3.5 percent) closed in the red zone. CHCC (down 1.0 percent) announced its 1HFY19 EPS at Rs 5.82 with no cash payout. Fertilizers also came under the hammer where ENGRO (down 0.5 percent), FFC (down 0.4 percent) and EFERT (down 0.5 percent) closed in the red zone. Mixed sentiments were seen in banking sector where HBL (up 0.7 percent), MCB (up 0.3 percent) and UBL (up 2.9 percent) closed in the green. On the other hand, BAHL (down 0.8 percent) and BAFL (down 1.4 percent) were the major laggards of the aforementioned sector. In Chemicals, LOTCHEM (down 1.9 percent) reported its 2018 EPS of Rs 2.93 with no cash payout. MTL (down 1.3 percent) also reported 1HFY19 consolidated EPS of Rs 41.11 with no dividend.