Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) has reversed its trend on Thursday and edged up about 91 points in topsy-turvy trading.
The bourse faced selling pressure at regular intervals amid a lack of positive triggers and anticipation of a mini-budget. Investors cheered the confirmation from the finance ministry that the sixth review of the Extended Fund Facility will be presented to the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) executive board on January 12.
The KSE-100 index opened up and continued to rise during the day as market participants remained optimistic. However, selling pressure emerged in the second half of trading, which wiped off some of the gains. Nevertheless, the KSE-100 managed to close in the green with some gains.
Today, the benchmark KSE-100 index edged upwards by 91.9 points to close at 44,266.90 points. A report from Arif Habib Limited noted that the market continued to remain range-bound due to the ambiguity over mini-budget.
“The market opened in the green zone as SBP raised Rs158 billion through PIBs, hefty participation indicating yields to stay at the same level in the near future,” the report said, adding that the market battled between the bulls and bears throughout the day due to lack of any key positive trigger.
The brokerage house added that the mainboard volumes remained dull whereas activity continued to move side-ways as the market witnessed hefty volumes in the third tier stocks. Sectors contributing to the performance included technology and communication (+69.2 points), investment banks/investment companies/security companies (+12.3 points), cement (+11.6 points) vanaspati and allied industries (+6.5 points) and power generation and distribution (+4.91 points).
Shares of 357 companies were traded during the session. At the close of trading, 199 scrips closed in the green, 135 in the red, and 23 remained unchanged. Overall trading volumes dropped to 240.42 million shares compared with Wednesday’s tally of 151.78 million. The value of shares traded during the day was Rs8.02 billion.
Hum Network Limited was the volume leader with 48.7 million shares traded, gaining Rs0.66 to close at Rs6.88. It was followed by TRG Pakistan with 19.92 million shares traded, gaining Rs6.82 to close at Rs124.35 and Unity Foods with 17.7 million shares traded, gaining Rs0.54 to close at Rs27.69.
