KSE-100 index declines by 175 points on PKR lows

KSE-100 index declines by 175 points on PKR lows

KARACHI: The benchmark KSE-100 index of Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) fell by 175 points on Wednesday owing to historic low of Pak Rupee (PKR) against the dollar.

The index closed at 46,717 points as against previous day’s closing of 46,891.

Analysts at Arif Habib Limited said that the market continued the downtrend following the slippage in PKR parity with USD that deteriorated further to touch 169.70 in interbank and crossed 170 in open market.

Unabated foreign selling coincided with local mutual funds disposing positions on the pretext of redemptions. Cement, E&P, O&GMCs, Refinery sectors bore the brunt of persistent selling. Limited buying interest was observed in Technology stocks which came down in the past couple of sessions.

Among scrips, TPL led the volumes table with 29.6 million shares, followed by TELE (28.1 million) and BYCO (23.2 million).

Sectors contributing to the performance include Cement (-83 points), Textile (-22 points), Pharma (-21 points), E&P (-20 points) and Banks (+45 points).

Volumes declined from 479.8 million shares to 332.8 million shares (-31 per cent DoD). Average traded value also dropped by 24 per cent to reach US$ 67.6 million as against US$ 88.9 million.

Stocks that contributed significantly to the volumes include TPL, TELE, BYCO, SERFR and WTL, which formed 36 per cent of total volumes.

Stocks that contributed positively to the index include UBL (+30 points), TRG (+22 points), FFBL (+15 points), BAHL (+15 points) and FABL (+12 points). Stocks that contributed negatively include MLCF (-21 points), HMB (-18 points), SYS (-17 points), AGP (-17 points) and MEBL (-16 points).