KARACHI: The stock market witnessed an increase of 353 points on Thursday as positive sentiments prevailed over expected package to be announced by the prime minister during his Karachi visit.
The benchmark KSE-100 index of Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) closed at 42,188 points as against 41,835 points showing an increase of +353 points.
Analysts at Arif Habib Limited said that after posting one the recent high volumes on the bourse with 837 million shares, the market stepped up to clinch 917 million today, yet another high.
Investor sentiment has been sky high in recent times, especially on the expectation of an announcement by Prime Minister on his scheduled visit to Karachi on September 04, 2020.
Infrastructure development is expected to positively impact construction sector scrips, which prompted Investors to take interest in Cement and Steel sectors.
MLCF and PIOC also hit upper circuits on the notification of substantial shareholding by sponsors.
Among banking sector stocks, NBP continued the uptrend after posting an outstanding result yesterday.
Banking sector stocks topped the volumes with 123.8 million shares, followed by Cement (112 million) and Technology (93.3 million). Among scrips, UNITY posted 51.2 million shares, followed by BOP (49.7 million) and KEL (41.8 million).
Sectors contributing to the performance include Cement (+89 points), Banks (+51 points), O&GMCs (+44 points), Textile (+41 points) and Fertilizer (+35 points).
Volumes increased further from 837 million shares to 919.4 million shares (+10 percent DoD). Average traded value also increased by 1 percent to reach US$ 159.9 million as against US$ 157.6 million.
Stocks that contributed significantly to the volumes include UNITY, BOP, KEL, MLCF and HASCOL, which formed 24 percent of total volumes.
Stocks that contributed positively to the index include MLCF (+31 points), SYS (+29 points), KTML (+22 points), NBP (+21 points) and PIOC (+19 points).
Stocks that contributed negatively include HUBC (-25 points), BAHL (-13 points), POL (-8 points), OGDC (-6 points) and DAWH (-5 points).
