Pakistan stocks witness bloodbath due to economic woes

Pakistan stocks witness bloodbath due to economic woes

KARACHI: Pakistan stocks witnessed bloodbath session on Monday due to rising economic worries and political uncertainty.

The benchmark KSE-100 index of Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) ended down to 41,613 points from last Friday’s closing of 42,150 points, showing a decline of 537 points.

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Analysts at Arif Habib Limited said that a bloodbath session was recorded at the PSX during the day.

The market opened in the green, but lack of investor participation and redemptions caused the index to drop 632 points intraday and close in the red.

Volumes in the mainboard dried up notably as a result of political noise in the country, and third-tier companies continued to lead the volume board.

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Analysts at Topline Securities said that after a slight positive opening market witnessed profit taking as investor varied over delayed IMF 9th review and subsequent approval of $1.2 billion loan tranche followed by unstable economic conditions and poor foreign reserves led the investor’s confidence in check.

Sectors contributing to the performance include Cement (-127.1 points), Technology & Communication (-89.0 points), Commercial Banks (-76.2 points), Fertilizer (-50.6 points), E&P’s (-42.4 points).

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Volumes decreased from 143.2 million shares to 126.3 million shares (-11.8 per cent DoD). The average traded value also decreased by 36.4 per cent to USD 14.5 million as against USD 22.8 million.

Stocks that contributed significantly to the volumes are WTL, FCCL, HASCOL, KEL and DSIL.

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