The bench mark registered substantial gain because of short covering in Oil and Gas exploration stocks, placement of proceeds from Engro towards other dividend yielders in fertilizer sector and low volume influx in ill-liquid stock.
Despite being the volume leader Engro failed to stage a recovery on the grounds of technical short covering.
A below expectation announcement by PPL invited volumetric sell-off and forced the stock to wipe off early gains and enter the red zone.
Yet air pocket openings in various front line speculative stocks kept the active participants in search of dips. KSE 100 index closed at 12326.14 levels with a gain of 160.16 points and total volume stood at 45,460,495 along with the total value of 3,536,337,914. KSE 30 index gained 152.92 points to close at 11681.83 levels and All Share index closed at 8559.54 levels after gaining 106.49 points.
Total 168 scrips advanced 78 declined and 100 remained unchanged out of the total 346 scrips traded. With financial and economic woes persisting along with declining volume at the local bourse, being calculative and selective is recommended. Snap rallies in the last week of the fiscal mainly for portfolio dressing might offer options to sell expensive stocks and re-cover them for short term trading in early next fiscal, said Hasnain Ashgar Ali at Aziz Fidahusein.
Dividend yielding stocks will show accumulation. With participants likely to reduce further, volatility on the benchmark may be on the
higher side as wider market is likely to stay under pressure mainly
due to stagnation in which low volume price erosion will be a prominent feature, he added.
