Back-to-back bull blitzes

The bulls prolonged their parade on Tuesday with the KSE 100-share index gaining 60.70 points. The day saw the index closing up by 0.42 percent at 14, 445.28 points against 14, 384.58 points of Monday. Pakistan Stocks closed bullish in the corporate results announcement session at KSE on strong earnings outlook; this was opined by Ahsan Mehanti, director at Arif Habib Investments Limited.
On second working day of the week, the trading volumes at the ready-counter were recorded higher at 105.343 million shares against 73.852 million shares of the previous day. The trading value increased to Rs 4.017 billion compared to Rs 2.922 billion of the previous session. The intraday high and low, respectively, stood at 14, 485.44 and 14, 373.66 points.
He added that the activity remained thin as investor’s awaited Supreme Court reaction on NRO judgment implementation next week.
The market capitalisation grew modestly and increased to Rs 3.685 trillion from Rs 3.671 trillion a day earlier. Of the total 371 traded scrips, 166 gained, 106 lost and 99 finished as unchanged. The free-float KSE-30 index adds 89.34 points to close at 12, 534.58 points against the previous 12, 445.24 points. Jahangir Siddiqui Company Limited was the day’s volume leader counting its traded shares at 13.496 million with the opening and closing rates standing at Rs 14.03 and Rs 14.66, followed by, DGK Cement, Lotte Pakistan PTA, Engro Foods Limited, and Lucky Cement with turnover of 12.813 million, 8.726 million, 8.036 million and 4.071 million shares respectively.
Mehanti said that the institutional support witnessed in blue chip stocks in oil, banking and cement sector ahead of release of US Coalition Support Fund of $1.5b despite concerns for security situation in the city. On the future market, the turnover increased by over one million shares to 10.880 million against 9.375 million shares of first working day of the week Monday.
The UniLever Pakistan and Bata Pakistan Limited, up Rs 34.52 and Rs 24.27, led highest price gainers while, UniLever Food and Colgate Palmolive, down Rs 114.72 and Rs 59.70 respectively, led the losers.