KARACHI: Stocks continued to bleed on Tuesday with the KSE-100 index sinking deeper by 251 points (0.53 per cent) to close at 46,874.

Faisal Shaji, Chief Strategy Officer at Standard Capital, admitted that the delay in the announcement of the Panamagate case verdict was taking its toll on the market.

He also pointed to some other reasons that have dampened investor sentiments, which include delay in the launch of a refurbished leverage product, the over-taxed capital market, though highly documented and regulated.

He also pointed out that the Chinese investors were still weighing the pros and cons of entering the PSX, while few hundred local individual investors with lukewarm participation from institutions, were driving the market.

The trading activity was volatile with the benchmark hovering between intraday high by 58 points and low by 316 points.

The volume increased by 7pc from the earlier session to 164.5 million shares, while the traded value rose by 15pc at Rs9.4 billion.

According to Topline Sec­urities, maximum down­side contribution came from HBL which fell 1.8pc, MCB 1.4pc, ISL 5pc, Nestle 2.5pc and PPL 1.1pc, wiping off 148 points, while gains in MARI 2.7pc, HASCOL 4.5pc, NBP 2.4pc, OGDC 0.7pc and Shell 5pc, adding 75 points to the index.

Ahsan Mehanti at Arif Habib Corp stated that the stocks closed lower amid thin trade as investors await the Panamagate case decision, which when announced is likely to ease political noise.

“Concerns over dismal exports, current account deficit, foreign outflows and high circular debt played a catalyst role in a bearish close,” he added.

Published in Dawn, April 19th, 2017