The Karachi stock market remained positive on Thursday and gained 24.54 points on the back of what the analysts observed institutional interest in the blue-chip scrips from oil and banking sectors. “Positive close was witnessed at KSE on institutional interest in oil and banking sector stocks,” said Ahsan Mehanti, director at Arif Habib Investments. The day witnessed the benchmark 100-share index closing at 11,557.37 points against 11,532.83 points of Wednesday. The intraday high and low was, respectively, recorded at 11,613.24 and 11,532.83 points. Whereas the trading volumes remained as low as 27.472 million shares compared to 38.491 million shares of the previous day. The trading value, however, set in the red zone and fell to Rs1.259 billion against Rs1.546 billion on the previous day.
Of the total 313 traded scrips, 111 advanced, 108 declined and 94 remained unchanged. The market capitalisation closed static at Rs3.00 trillion. The KSE-30 index also gained 19.63 points to close at 10,819.87 points compared to 10,800.24 points of the previous day. The intraday high and low for the index was recorded at 10,861.89 and 10,780.88 points.
The analysts said that the investors shrugged off the ongoing diplomatic tensions in the Pakistan-US ties and the affects of central bank’s static policy rate at 12 percent on Wednesday.
Jahanigir Siddiqui Company maintained its position as volume leader of the day and counted its traded shares at 3.319 million with its share price, however, closing lower at Rs5.61 after opening at Rs5.83. Other best performers included Japan Power, Silkbank Limited, MCB Bank Limited, DG Khan Cement, Fauji Fertiliser Bin Qasim, Engro CorpSPOT, Fatima Fertiliser Company, Netsol Technologies and Oil and Gas Development Company Limited. The companies’ traded shares were counted, respectively, at 2.5 million, 1.7 million, 1.2 million, 1.2 million, 1.2 million, 1.0 million, 1.0 million, 1.0 million and 0.920 million shares.
The future market also marked a downward activity and saw the trading turnover decreasing to 2.3 million shares against 3.3 million shares of the previous day. The scrips that gained numbered 45, those categorised as minus were 60 and three remained unchanged. Engro-DEC continued to lead the companies with 0.606 million of its shares traded on the day.
