KARACHI: The Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) witnessed another range-bound and low-volume session amid concerns over the upcoming mini-budget, with the benchmark KSE-100 Index gaining 130.30 points (+0.30 percent) to close at 44,043.74 points.
The market opened on a positive note and remained almost in the green territory throughout the session. The investors remained cautious due to the start of the rollover week and the upcoming mini-budget. The market observed a dull trading session due to lack of fresh triggers also.
The KSE-100 Index moved in a range of 210.7 points, showing an intraday high of 44,117.1 points and a low of 43,906.4 points.
A total of 367 companies traded shares in the stock exchange, out of them shares of 165 closed up, shares of 174 closed down while shares of 28 companies remained unchanged. Out of 96 traded companies in the KSE-100 Index, 55 closed up, 36 closed down and five remained unchanged.
The overall market volumes increased by 28.78 million to 143.45 million shares. Total volumes traded for the KSE-100 Index increased by 9.68 million to 63.14 million shares. The number of total trades increased by 7,520 to 68,654, while the value traded increased by Rs0.57 billion to Rs4.99 billion. Overall market capitalisation increased by Rs17.42 billion.
Among scrips, UNITYR3 topped the volumes with 18.87 million shares, followed by TRG (12.41 million) and HUMNL (11.75 million). Stocks that contributed significantly to the volumes included UNITYR3, TRG, HUMNL, KEL and UNITY, which formed around 41 percent of total volumes.
The major sectors taking the index toward north were technology & communication with 59 points, oil & gas exploration companies with 44 points, cement with 9 points, automobile assembler with 9 points and oil & gas marketing companies with 7 points. The most points added to the index were by TRG which contributed 59 points followed by MARI with 23 points, POL with 11 points, ABL with 8 points and DGKC with 8 points.
The major sectors taking the index toward south were fertilizer with 27 points, power generation & distribution with 6 points and refinery with one point. The most points taken off the index were by ENGRO which stripped the index of 18 points followed by FFC with 11 points, HUBC with 7 points, KOHC with 7 points and MLCF with 5 points.
