Stock market gains 236 points as international oil prices gain

Stock market gains 236 points as international oil prices gain

KARACHI: The stock market gained 236 points on Friday owing to slight improvement in international oil prices, analysts said.

The benchmark KSE-100 index of Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) closed at 33,931 points as against 33,695 points showing an increase of 236 points.

Analysts at Arif Habib Limited said that the market traded in the positive zone today, which was primarily caused by slight improvement in international crude prices (as compared to yesterday).

E&P, OMCs largely remained positive, whereas Cement and Banking sector scrips also rebounded from recent lows.

Cement Sector stocks saw an attrition of 10 percent in the past couple of sessions, from recent peaks, and highlighted an opportunity to the investors for rebound, especially today being the last trading day of the roll-over week.

Pharmaceutical sector, on the contrary, slid down with FEROZ hitting lower circuit.

Technology sector continued trending upward and posted high volumes with 34.3 million shares, followed by Cement (26.7 million) and Vanaspati (25.8 million).

Among scrips, UNITY led the volumes with 25.8 million shares, followed by HASCOL (19.5 million) and TRG (16.5 million).

Sectors contributing to the performance include E&P (+68 points), Cement (+43 points), Power (+39 points), Banks (+37 points), Insurance (+26 points) and Food (-31 points).

Volumes increased further from 14.8 million shares to 233 million shares (+20 percent DoD).

Average traded value also increase by 39 percent to reach US$ 62.4 million as against US$ 45.1 million.

Stocks that contributed significantly to the volumes include UNITY, HASCOL, TRG, MLCF and FFL, which formed 37 percent of total volumes.

Stocks that contributed positively to the index include OGDC (+53 points), HUBC (+32 points), LUCK (+31 points), PPL (+24 points) and ABOT (+16 points). Stocks that contributed negatively include ENGRO (-34 points), NESTLE (-26 points), MCB (-16 points), PAKT (-11 points), and PSO (-8 points).