The Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) remained bullish for the second day in a row on Friday, with the benchmark KSE-100 Index gaining 487.85 points (+1.1 percent) to close at 44,821.53 points.
The market opened on a positive note. But soon went on a selling spree. Which brought the index down by almost 136 points. However, the traded volumes remained very low at this stage and later the market remained on a bullish trend. Which continued for both sessions of the day. The KSE-100 Index gained around 1,600 points, albeit overall volumes remained around 300 millions, during the last two days.
The KSE-100 Index moved in a range of 637.7 points. Showing an intraday high of 44,834.8 points and a low of 44,197.1 points. Among other indices, the KSE All Share Index gained 265.51 points (+0.87 percent) to close at 30,770.14 points. All Share Islamic Index gained 274.22 points (+1.27 percent) to close at 21,915.64 points.
A total of 375 companies traded shares in the stock exchange. Out of them shares of 237 closed up, shares of 123 closed down. Shares of 15 companies remained unchanged. Out of 92 traded companies in the KSE-100 Index, 65 closed up. As many as 26 closed down and one remained unchanged.
The overall market volumes decreased by 54.27 million to 334.33 million shares. Total volume traded for the KSE-100 Index was 152.02 million shares. The number of total trades decreased by 13,289 to 121,303, while the value traded decreased by Rs1.29 billion to Rs11.80 billion. The market capitalisation increased by Rs47.28 billion.
Among scrips, SERF led the table with 34.26 million shares, followed by UNITY (26.47 million) and WTL (25.49 million). Stocks that contributed significantly to the volumes include SERF, UNITY, WTL, TREET, and BYCO, which formed 36.5 percent of total volumes.
The spropping up the index were oil & gas exploration companies with 138 points, fertilizer with 79 points. The others includes; cement with 57 points, commercial banks with 46 points and food & personal care products with 25 points. The most points added to the index were by PPL which contributed 49 points followed by POL with 43 points. MCB with 39 points, OGDC with 38 points and SYS with 31 points.
Sector wise, the index was let down by tobacco with 14 points. , glass & ceramics with 4 points and miscellaneous with 2 points. The most points taken off the index were by TRG which stripped the index of 25 points followed by PAKT with 14 points, HMB with 12 points, FABL with 7 points and AGP with 6 points.
According to experts, the ongoing talks between the government and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) remained the centre of attention for the investors. Agenda of the meeting is to club two reviews under the Extended Fund Facility and approving one million dollar loan tranche.
They said the finance minister hinted at over 5 percent growth projections for FY22, strong financial results and investors’ expectations regarding the release of the next IMF tranche, amid resumption of $6 billion EFF, played a catalytic role in the bullish close. Adding that they added that the bullish activity continued on surging global equities and crude oil prices.
Expersts termed it as healthy activity after a long time witnessed in blue-chip stocks. Looking ahead, the market needs to sustain its bullish momentum. They advised investors to buy mainly blue-chip stocks on major dips across-the-board, they said.
Kamran Nazir Malik is a law graduate and master in Economics. He is associated with TLTP News Wire Service as correspondent since 2018.
