KARACHI – Investors preferred to remain sidelined amid growing diplomatic tensions between Pakistan and the US government. The local bourse moved both ways as the benchmark index closed after shedding merely 17 points. Jolt to US-Pakistan ties after the arrest of American citizen and ensuing complications further worsened political uncertainties.
The KSE-100 index dwindled 16.51 points and closed at 12,061.77 points, while total volume and total value stood at 38,615,653 and 2,853,759,423 respectively. The KSE-30 index lost 49.09 points to close at 11,642.85 levels, while the all share index closed at 8,425.66 points after losing 14.34 points. Dreary volumes of 69 million shares depicted lack of confidence as investors chose to shun fallout. Dera Ghazi Khan Cement announced result of the first half of the financial year 2011 of Rs 0.53/share, inline with market expectations.
However, it failed to ignite positive price movement. Market performance is likely to remains dull, whilst consolidation also remains weak, said Senior Investment Analyst at Habib Metropolitan Financial Services (HMFS) Salman Vidhani. He added that healthy growth in corporate earnings, implementation of MTS and resolution of diplomatic row is likely to draw investor back, but only after few hiccups. Earning per share of Rs 0.53 of DGKC in the 1HFY11, in addition to a right issue of 20 percent at a premium of Rs 10 depressed investor sentiments and took the index into red zone.
Out of total 654 scrips, 93 advanced 179 declined and 382 remain unchanged. Market capitalisation of KSE stood at Rs 3,263.95 billion, while the future volume stood at 4.58 million shares. The top gainers were Unilever Pakistan, Bank Al-Habib, Habib Metropolitan, Dawood Hercules Chemicals, IGI Insurance, Murree Brewery and ICI Pakistan. Similarly, top losers were KASB Bank, DG Khan Cement, Rafhan Maize Products, Media Times, Nishat Mills, WorldCall Telecom and Ibrahim Fibre.
