January 05, 2007	Friday	Zilhaj 14, 1427

KARACHI, Jan 4: Selective support figured prominently on the blue chips counter on Thursday boosted by active short-covering in leading bank and oil shares but the broader market stayed weak. The KSE 100-share index posted a fresh rise of 118 points at 10,184.52.

Although buying support was fairly strong, it remained confined to a dozen active scrips, notably index-based in an apparent effort to give a bullish outlook to the new year’s market debut. The underlying sentiment was, however, mixed.

The volume figure failed to keep pace owing to pressure on money supply from the CFS market due to technical factors including long weekend.

The KSE 100-share index maintained its recovery drive followed by active short-covering in leading base shares, notably MCB and National Bank at the attractively lower levels and finished higher by another 118.20 points.

But the buying support was terribly selective and demonstrated that institutional traders were yet to resume new year buying on a bigger scale possibly by the next week.

The KSE 100-share index recorded a fresh rise of 118.20 points or 1.17 per cent at 10,184.52 as compared to 10,068.32 a day earlier. The KSE 30-share index also gained 184.97 points at 12,735.23 points as leading base shares remained in strong demand.

“I would not call it a new year bullish showing as it is essentially based on the strength of leading base shares,” stock analyst Faisal A. Rajabali said, adding “the weakness of the broader market reflects some reservations on the part of big punters about its future direction”.

Leading base shares including MCB, PTCL, National Bank, Pakistan Petroleum, Bank of Punjab and some others were in the buying range owing to persistent decline last month and came under speculative squeeze.Both MCB and National Bank finished the session around the upper locks and signal the potential of fresh price flare-up as the rates of the both are still far below their last year’s best levels.

“But failure of the oil sector to ride the bandwagon apparently in the absence of foreign buying did not allow the consolidation forces to play their due role in an oversold market,” analyst Ahsan Mehanti said.

Although opinions are still divided over the future direction of the market, all agree on one point that the worst may be over and a strong technical rebound is expected to manifest itself in a bigger way.

“Despite the fact that political undercurrent may not be that positive, the market’s technical position warrants a sustained run-up at the lower levels,” analyst Ashraf Zakria predicts.

Leading gainers were led by Lakson Tobacco and Nestle Pakistan, up by Rs15 and Rs40, followed by Jahangir Siddiqui & Co, EFU General, Mirpurkhas Sugar, Pakistan Tobacco, PSO, Pakistan Cable, Glaxo-SKF, Berger Paints National Bank and MCB, up by Rs3 to Rs8.25.

Losses on the other hand were modest, Central Insurance and Mustehkam Cement were prominent among them, off Rs5.95 and Rs6.25 respectively. Al-Abbas Sugar, National Refinery, Attock Petroleum and Callmate Telips followed them, off Rs3 to Rs3.95.

Trading volume showed a modest rise as sellers were not inclined to sell hoping further rise in prices and rose to 99m shares from the previous 27m shares but losers held a fair lead over the gainers at 144 to 126, with 26 shares holding on to the last levels.

National Bank, which has been under pressure for the last about one month on various negative news, closed around its upper lock at Rs232, up by Rs8 on 17m shares, followed by MCB, higher by Rs8.25 at Rs255.50 on 9m shares, and PTCL, firm by Rs2.20 at Rs46.40 on 8m shares.

Bank of Punjab, up Rs2.25 at Rs103.55 on 7m shares, OGDC, lower by 55 paisa at Rs114.50 on 6m shares, Pakistan Petroleum, higher by Rs1.95 at Rs236.40 on 5m shares and Bank Alfalah, up by 95 paisa at Rs43.10 also on 5m shares.

Other actives were led by Nishat Mills, up by 85 paisa on 4m shares, D.G. Khan Cement, lower 80 paisa on 3m shares and PICIC, up by 70 paisa also on 3m shares.

FORWARD COUNTER: National Bank also led the list of actives, higher by Rs7.40 at Rs233.10 on 10m shares, followed by MCB, up by Rs8.50 at Rs256 on 8m shares and PTCL, firm by Rs1.95 at Rs46.55 on 3m shares.

Pakistan Petroleum followed them, up by Rs1.80 at Rs237.30 on 2m shares and Bank of Punjab, higher by Rs1.90 at Rs103.85 on 2m shares.

DEFAULTER COS: Nimir Industrial Chemicals again came in for modest support and rose by five paisa at Rs3.15 on 0.719m shares followed by Crescent Standard Bank, easy by five paisa at Rs5.05 on 0.204m shares and Zeal-Pak Cement, lower 30 paisa at Rs4.15 on 0.165m shares.