Stock market falls by 289 points in narrow range trading

Stock market falls by 289 points in narrow range trading

KARACHI: The stock market fell by 289 points on Monday owing to narrow range trading activity.

The benchmark KSE-100 index of Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) closed at 40,443 points as against 40,732 points showing a decline of 289 points.

Analysts at Arif Habib Limited said that the market opened on a positive note today at +72 points and 1.3 million shares traded at opening.

The benchmark index went up by 184 points in the morning and largely traded in a narrow range for good part of the session.

Near close of session market saw profit booking, which brought the index down by 417 points and closed the session at -289 points. Banking, OMCs, Steel, Autos and Cement sector stocks saw major sell off.

Cement sector led the volumes table with 44.3 million shares, followed by Chemical (37.4 million) and O&GMCs (31.4 million). Among scrips, UNITY led the volumes with 26.8 million shares, followed by MLCF (18.7 million) and LOTCHEM (15.4 million).

Sectors contributing to the performance include Banks (-152 points), Cement (-65 points), O&GMCs (-58 points), Power (-45 points), Autos (-27 points), Fertilizer (+27 points), E&P (+24 points), Food (+22 points).

Volumes declined further from 417.1 million shares to 320.1 million shares (-23 percent DoD). Average traded value also declined by 25 percent to reach US$ 73.5 million as against US$ 97.9 million.

Stocks that contributed significantly to the volumes include UNITY, MLCF, LOTCHEM, PAEL and HASCOL, which formed 27 percent of total volumes.

Stocks that contributed positively include ENGRO (+23 points), NESTLE (+18 points), OGDC (+13 points), MARI (+10 points) and EPCL (+8 points). Stocks that contributed negatively include UBL (-60 points), HBL (-37 points), LUCK (-35 points), PSO (-33 points), and HUBC (-30 points).