KARACHI: The Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) remained bearish for the third day on Monday amid a low-volume session, with the benchmark KSE-100 Index shedding 519.41 points (-1.21 percent) to close at 42,876.37 points.
The market remained in the green zone only for a few minutes at the start of the session, and later succumbed to selling pressure and remained in the negative zone till end of the session, as the investors opted to square their positions and remain cautious, anticipating an aggressive interest rate hike on Tuesday.
The KSE-100 Index moved in a range of 671.93 points, showing an intraday high of 43,478.61 points and a low of 42,806.68 points.
A total of 342 companies traded shares in the stock exchange, out of them shares of 68 closed up, shares of 257 closed down while shares of 17 companies remained unchanged. Out of 91 traded companies in the KSE-100 Index, 14 closed up, 76 closed down and one remained unchanged.
The overall market volumes decreased by 28.78 million to 150.39 million shares. Total volumes traded for the KSE-100 Index decreased by 10.79 million shares to 71.27 million shares. The number of total trades decreased by 17,952 to 68,091, while the value traded decreased by Rs1.47 billion to Rs5.26 billion. Overall market capitalisation decreased by Rs87.21 billion.
Among scrips, WTL topped the volumes with 18.33 million shares, followed by BYCO (7.3 million) and FATIMA (7 million). Stocks that contributed significantly to the volumes include WTL, BYCO, FATIMA, TRG, and HASCOL, which formed around 31 percent of total volumes.
The major sectors taking the index toward south were technology & communication with 147 points, oil & gas exploration companies with 88 points, commercial banks with 72 points, food & personal care products with 39 points and cement with 28 points. The most points taken off the index were by TRG which stripped the index of 75 points followed by SYS with 61 points, PPL with 38 points, UBL with 34 points, and OGDC with 34 points.
The major sectors taking the index toward north were fertilizer with 9 points, tobacco with 9 points, and glass & ceramics with 2 points. The most points added to the index were by BAHL which contributed 20 points followed by EFERT with 18 points, HMB with 14 points, PAKT with 9 points, and SCBPL with 9 points.
Meanwhile, the PSX has replaced three companies in the Karachi Meezan-30 Index (KMI-30) as they do not fall in the list of top 30 Shariah compliant stocks, according to a notice issued by the bourse.
The PSX informed that it has carried out a re-composition exercise of the KMI-30 index for the review period from January 1, 2021, to June 30, 2021, as a result of which, three companies namely; Pioneer Cement Limited, Byco Petroleum Pakistan Limited, and Azgard Nine Limited have been included in the index.
On the other hand, Pakistan International Bulk Terminal Limited, Sui Northern Gas Pipeline Limited and Honda Atlas Cars (Pak) Limited have been ousted from the index.
According to the notice, the re-composition has been carried out on the basis of the criteria of selection of companies as detailed in the brochure of KMI-30 Index, which can be seen on PSX’s website. The above changes in the KMI-30 index will be implemented from December 20, 2021.
