Stocks finish weekend session on bearish note

KARACHI: After a robust overnight rally, the stock market came under renewed profit-selling by nervous investors amid growing economic uncertainty as a result the benchmark KSE 100-share index settled below the 65,000 level on Friday.

Ahsan Mehanti of Arif Habib Corporation said challenges over external financing, uncertainty about the outcome of the ongoing IMF review and status quo expectations in the monetary policy announcement on March 18 amid SPI inflation surging 32.89pc year-on-year played a catalyst role in the bearish close.

Topline Securities Ltd attributed the market volatility to news reports that the IMF mission has expressed displeasure over the Ministry of Finance’s verdict that it had materialised all structural benchmarks before the completion of the review by the visiting mission.

The major positive contribution came from Engro Fertilisers, Meezan Bank Ltd, Lucky Cement, National Bank of Pakistan, Mari Petroleum Ltd and Systems Ltd, which cumulatively added 135 points to the index. On the other hand, Oil and Gas Development Company, Hub Power, Pakistan Petroleum Ltd, Bank Al-Habib, United Bank Ltd and PSO wiped out 179 points.

The index traded between its intraday high of 289 points and low of 248 points. As a result, the KSE-100 index closed at 64,816.47 points after losing 247.80 points or 0.38 per cent from the preceding session.

The overall trading dipped 17.72pc to 259.37 million shares. The traded value also declined 3.49pc to Rs10.12bn on a day-on-day basis.

Stocks contributing significantly to the traded volume included Hascol Petroleum Ltd (56.95m shares), Cnergyico PK Ltd (19.63m shares), WorldCall Telecom (16.54m shares), Telecard Ltd (9.77m shares) and Bank of Punjab (9.03m shares).

Shares registering the biggest increases in their share prices in absolute terms were Unilever Pakistan Foods Ltd (Rs100.00), Indus Motor Ltd (Rs21.86), Mari Petroleum Ltd (Rs15.97), Sazgar Engineering Works Ltd (Rs14.02) and Pakistan Services Ltd (Rs13.01).

Companies registering the biggest decreases in their share prices in absolute terms were Premium Textile Mills Ltd (Rs24.50), Mehmood Textile Mills Ltd (Rs16.67), Services Industries Ltd (Rs11.88), Packages Ltd (Rs10.82) and The Thal Industries Corporation Ltd(Rs10.20).

Foreign investors remained net sellers as they offloaded shares worth $0.29m.