KARACHI: The Karachi Stock Exchange (KSE) 100-share index on Thursday added another 3.13 per cent or 228 points at 7,498.34 to its new year tally on heavy buying, aided by reports of an official arrangement of bridge financing pending the launch of a new leverage product for both the ready and forward counters.
 
An idea of the sustained bull-run may well be had from the fact that the benchmark index breached through three successive barriers to hit the session’s high of 7,503.32 before ending slightly below this level.

'The market witnessed a virtual roar of the new leverage product, details of which are known to only a few privileged ones,' said Hasnain Asghar Ali, commenting on the massive rally, which lifted the turnover figure to a year’s high of about 200m shares.

But the snap rally reflected others may also know the salient features of the new product in due course and I don’t think the capital gains windfall is expected to be shared by a few, it would be universal, he added.

Analyst Ahsan Mehanti said another supporting factor was the cut in profit rates of National Saving Schemes and tax adjustments linked to bad loan and debts, which would give a positive breather to the banking sector.

Leading brokerage houses, financial institutions and foreign investors flooded the markets with fresh orders on the oil, fertiliser and banking sectors at the current lower levels as no one was inclined to miss an attractive bait of capital gains.

The fact that the KSE 100-share index breached through the three consecutive psychological barriers of 7,300, 7,400 and 7,500, respectively, indicates that the market was flooded by the buy stops, but no matching selling offers. It added about Rs63 billion to the market capital in the process at Rs,2,214 billion.

Although its march to its pre-reaction level of 15,674 points, hit some two years back, is still a distant goal, notably in the backdrop of war on terror, a thousand mile journey begins with the first step, some brokers said.

The KSE 30-share index also recovered 288.62 points or 3.74 per cent and touched the high mark of 8,000.53 points and so did all other indexes.

Unilever Pakistan, Wyeth Pakistan, Fazal Textiles, Colgate Pakistan and Attock Petroleum were among the top gainers, up by Rs11 and 15.46, followed by Habib Bank, MCB, Lakson Tobacco, Attock Refinery, National Refinery, PSO, Engro Chemical, Fauji Fertiliser, Pakistan Oilfields, Pakistan Petroleum, Exide Pakistan, Shezan International, which were quoted higher by Rs4.24 to 7.64.

Losers included HinoPak, Dadex Eternit, Ferozsons Lab, Haseeb Waqas Sugar and Shield Corporation, off by Rs2 to 3.95.

Trading volume soared to 195.946m shares from the previous 105m shares as gainers held a strong lead over the losers at 196 to 84, with 16 shares holding on to the last levels.

DG Khan Cement led the list of actives, steady by five paisa at Rs30.55 on 24m shares followed by PTCL, firm by 22 paisa at 17.87 on 15m shares, OGDC, up Rs3.53 at 83.81 on 14m shares, J S & Co, higher by Rs1.11 at 24.51 on 12m shares, Lucky Cement, up Rs2.39 at 61.54 on 12m shares, Arif Habib Securities, firm by Rs1.34 at 29.35 on 10m shares, and National Bank, up Rs3.31 at 71.42 on 7m shares.

Fauji Fertiliser Bin Qasim, steady 42 paisa at 18.36 on 6m shares, Engro Chemical, higher by Rs6.22 at 136.75 also on 6m shares and Pakistan Oilfields, up by Rs7.38 at 156.35 also on 6m shares.

FORWARD COUNTER: Speculative issues on the forward counter also followed the lead of their counterparts in the ready section and rose across the board under the lead of oil, banking and fertiliser shares without any transaction.