KARACHI: The Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) nosedived on Monday due to rollover week and massive hike of 150bps in policy rate by the State Bank of Pakistan, with the benchmark KSE-100 Index shedding 744.41 points (-1.63 percent) to close at 45,745 points.
The market opened on a positive note and gained over 110 points during the first 25 minutes of the session; however, later a massive profit taking activity gripped the market that continued for the rest of the session.
The KSE-100 Index moved in a range of 885.3 points, showing an intraday high of 46,601.90 points and a low of 45,716.60 points. Among other indices, the KSE All Share Index shed 418.93 points (-1.32 percent) to close at 31,309.15 points, while All Share Islamic Index shed 314.19 points (-1.39 percent) to close at 22,301.65 points.
A total of 360 companies traded shares in the stock exchange, out of them shares of 77 closed up, shares of 270 closed down while shares of 13 companies remained unchanged. Out of 95 traded companies in the KSE-100 Index, 14 closed up, 80 closed down and one remained unchanged.
The overall market volumes decreased by 42.31 million to 261.90 million. Total volumes traded for the KSE-100 Index remained 126.43 million shares. The number of total trades decreased by 1,626 to 109,279, while the value traded decreased by Rs1.06 billion to Rs10.94 billion. Overall market capitalisation decreased by Rs104.90 billion.
Among scrips, TRG topped the volumes with 22.37 million shares, followed by BYCO (21.6 million) and TPLP (15.81 million). Stocks that contributed significantly to the volumes include TRG, BYCO, TPLP, TREET, and GTECH, which formed around 32 percent of total volumes.
The sectors taking the index toward south were cement with 184 points, technology & communication with 153 points, oil & gas exploration companies with 90 points, fertilizers with 70 points and textile composite with 38 points. The most points taken off the index were by LUCK which stripped the index of 96 points followed by TRG with 87 points, SYS with 56 points, ENGRO with 39 points and MCB with 38 points.
The sectors taking the index toward north were sugar & allied industries with one point, closed-end mutual fund with 0.64 points and modarabas with 0.4 points. The most points added to the index were by MEBL which contributed 37 points followed by BAHL with 14 points, UBL with 12 points, BAFL with 4 points and ATLH with 2 points.
According to experts, there is an acute lack of investor confidence in the market; however, the market may improve in the next couple of days. They said that the massive hike in interest rate dented the market badly. They said that investors are preferring small shares, which may cause huge losses for small traders.
