Tuesday witnessed bears dominating the Karachi Stock Exchange (KSE) on the back of investors’ concern for falling global capital markets due to the potential US and Europe sovereign debt crises and rising foreign outflow from Pakistan’s capital markets. “Bearish activity witnessed in the earnings announcement session at KSE amid thin trade,” said Ahsan Mehanti, Director Arif Habib Investments.
The benchmark, KSE 100-share index, lost some 30.43 points or 0.25 percent to close at 12,364.06 points against 12,394.49 of Monday.
“Concerns for falling global capital markets and foreign outflow at Pakistan stock exchanges played a key role in negative close at KSE,” Mehanti viewed.
Tuesday saw the KSE-100 index hitting the intraday high and low of 12,458.43 and 12,343.08 points, respectively. The day of bearish trading saw 95 scrips gaining, 172 losing while 101 remained unchanged.
The market capitalization also remained in the red zone to close at Rs3.266 trillion against 3.271 trillion of Monday, the turnover at ready-counter was recorded at 54.538 million shares against 32.820 million a day earlier.
The NIB Bank appeared was the volume leader of the day with 18.048 million of its shares traded with per share rate opening and closing at 0.01 paisa.
The future market, however, saw an upset and closed at 2.949 million shares against Monday’s 2.424 million.
The market observers expect some improvement with the start of corporate results season. “Expectations for strong earning announcements in blue chip banks, cement, oil and fertilizer scrips this week invited investor interest,” Mehanti said. The analyst said factors like a record earning announcement by the MCB Bank, expectations for strong earning announcements in blue chip banks, cement, oil and fertilizer scrips this week invited investor interest.
According to an MCB statement which was issued here on Tuesday, the bank had registered remarkable financial performance during January-June FY11 with its before and after tax profits increasing to Rs16.162 billion and Rs 10.571 billion respectively. The analysts expect that such encouraging corporate results would entice the investors at Karachi bourse where the daily average volumes had dropped to a worrying 40 million shares for various reasons.
