Stocks gain 341 points on investors confidence

Stocks gain 341 points on investors confidence

KARACHI: The stock market gained 341 points on Friday as investors gained confidence due to stability in Afghanistan. The benchmark KSE-100 index of Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) closed at 47,600 points as against last trading on August 17, 2021 at 47,258 points.

Analysts at Arif Habib Limited said that the market added another 341 points during the session today, after gaining traction earlier in the week.

Relatively stability in Afghanistan helped investors gain confidence, especially the decision to drop custom duties on different items that will particularly improve dispatches for Cement sector.

Today’s session was a reflection of that, with cement, Banks, steel, refinery, fertilizer and O&GMCs sectors contributing positively to the index.

On the flip side, E&P sector regressed due to significant drop in international crude oil prices witnessed in the past couple of days when PSX was off. Among scrips, GGL topped the volumes with 21.6 million shares, followed by BYCO (18.8 million) and TPL (10.4 million).

Sectors contributing to the performance include Cement (+182 points), Banks (+73 points), O&GMCs (+39 points), Engineering (+27 points) and Fertilizer (+15 points).

Volumes increased from 246 million shares to 299.1 million shares (+22 per cent DoD). Average traded value also increased by 14 per cent to reach US$ 80 million as against US$ 70 million.

Stocks that contributed significantly to the volumes include GG, BYCO, TPL, SILK and WTL, which formed 23 per cent of total volumes.

Stocks that contributed positively to the index include MEBL (+64 points), DGKC (+39 points), CHCC (+32 points), LUCK (+31 points) and PSO (+31 points). Stocks that contributed negatively include PSEL (-10 points), MARI (-9 points), TRG (-9 points), OGDC (-7 points) and NESTLE (-7 points).