KARACHI: The equity market ended down by 173 points on Thursday amid positive activities in many scrips. The benchmark KSE-100 index of Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) closed at 41,333 points as against 41,506 points showing a decline of 173 points.
Analysts at Arif Habib Limited said that the market corrected its course further, after yesterday’s decline of 109 points.
Today the market ended (unadjusted) 210 points down from yesterday’s closing.
“Although the sentiment remained positive and healthy activity was observed in Chemical, Cable and Steel, largely the sectors which gained in past couple of sessions saw profit booking.”
Chemical Sector saw LOTCHEM gaining momentum with a total volume of 16 million shares, whereas PAEL realized trading volume of 12 million shares among Cable.
Clearly, investors’ interest shifted from main board scrips to side board and downward trend in scrips like HBL, UBL, DGKC, LUCK caused concern among investors.
Sectors contributing to the performance include Banks (-52 points), Fertilizer (-47 points), Cement (-45 points), E&P (-33 points), Power (-29 points) and Engineering (+11 points).
Volumes declined further from 205 million shares 138 million shares (-33 percent DoD).
Average traded value also declined by 39 percent to reach US$44 million as against US$71 million.
Stocks that contributed significantly to the volumes include LOTCHEM, PAEL, PIAA, BOP and TRG, which formed 33 percent of total volumes.
Stocks that contributed positively include SEARL (+10 points), EFERT (+8 points), MEBL (+6 points), INDU (+5 points), and INIL (+5 points). Stocks that contributed negatively include DAWH (-29 points), PPL (-26 points), HUBC (-26 points), LUCK (-21 points) and UBL (-20 points).
