On first working day of the week Monday the bulls kept dominating Karachi stocks market with the benchmark, KSE 100-share index skyrocket 146.96 points. The day saw the index closing up by 1.05 percent at 14,083.44 points against 13,936.48 points of the last week. “(The) stocks closed bullish amid thin trade led by blue chip oil, banking and cement stocks ahead of major earnings announcements this week,” viewed Ashen Mehanti, director at Arif Habib Securities. The trading volumes at the ready-counter were recorded lower at 213.340 million shares against 244.205 million shares of the previous day.
The trading value was too surged to Rs 5.367 billion compared to Rs 6.485 billion of the previous session. The intraday high and low, respectively, stood at 14,098.05 and 13,936.48 points. The market capitalization grew modestly and increased to Rs 3.605 trillion from Rs 3.568 trillion a day earlier. Of the total 384 traded scrips, 193 gained, 123 lost and 68 finished as unchanged. The free-float KSE-30 index also gained 143.36 points to close at 12,366.41 points against the previous 12,223.05 points. The KSE all-share index closed with a gained of 101.80 points to 9,899.15 points as against 9,797.35 points. Fauji Cement was the day’s volume leader counting its traded shares at 23.436 million with the opening and closing rates standing at Rs 6.77 and Rs 7.04, followed by Bank Al-Falah XD, Jahangir Siddiqui Company, D.G.K. Cement and Bank of Punjab with turnover of 18.037 million, 13.991 million, 13.670 million and 11.870 million shares respectively. On the future market, the turnover recovered remarkably by over 10 million shares to 23.426 million against 11.236 million shares of last week. The Unilever Pakistan Limited and Unilever Food XD, up Rs 139.99 and Rs 95.91,led highest price gainers while, Rafhan Maize XD and Fazal Textile, down Rs 88.87 and Rs 17.86 respectively, led the losers. “Strong earning announcement and payout by PSO, renewed Institutional interest on strong earnings outlook played a catalyst role in bullish sentiments despite fall in global stocks, commodities and concerns for delay in implementation of revised CGT regime,” said analyst Mehnati.