Bulls surged with venom on Monday as the benchmark, KSE 100-share index crossed the 50-point mark in the northward direction, gaining 52.29 points. Ahsan Mehanti, Director at Arif Habib Investments Limited, said that the Pakistan Stocks closed higher amid cautious activity in the earnings announcement session at KSE.
The day saw the index rising 0.36 percent closing at 14, 384.58 points against 14, 332.29 points of last working day of the previous week.
The trading volumes at the ready-counter were recorded lower at 73.852 million shares against 111.919 million shares of the previous day. The trading value was down to Rs 2.922 billion compared to Rs 4.425 billion of the last day session. The intraday high and low, respectively, stood at 14, 417.35 and 14, 332.29 points.
Arif Habib added that the investors awaited Supreme Court reaction on NRO judgment implementation due next week. The market capitalisation grew modestly and increased to Rs 3.671 trillion from Rs 3.654 trillion a day earlier. Of the total 357 traded scrips, 145 gained, 113 lost and 99 remained unchanged.
The free-float KSE-30 index also gained 42.93 points to close at 12, 445.24 points against the previous 12, 402.31 points. The KSE all-share index closed with a gained of 34.11 points to 10, 116.99 points as against 10, 082.88 points. Mehanti stated that institutional support witnessed in blue chip stocks in oil, banking and cement sector on improvement in Pak-US relations, PPL license to explore in Iraq and speculations ahead of release of US Coalition Support Fund of $1.5bn despite concerns for Moody’s bond downgrade.
D.G.K. Cement was the day’s volume leader counting its traded shares at 17.916 million with the opening and closing rates standing at Rs 43.49 and Rs 44.64, followed by NIB Bank Limited, Engro Food Limited, Cherat Cement, Jahangir Siddiqui Company and Lucky Cement with turnover of 6.688 million, 5.127 million, 4.214 million, 2.950 million and 2.497 million shares respectively.
On the future market, the turnover decreased by over six million shares to 9.375 million against 15.036 million shares of Friday.
The Rafhan Maize Prod and Unilever Food, up Rs 147.27 and Rs 57.40, lead highest price gainers while, Colgate Palmolive and Siemens Pakistan, down Rs 44.95 and Rs 21.57 respectively, led the losers.
