KARACHI, June 18: Stocks plunged for the third day in a row with the KSE-100 index witnessing an erosion of 296.83 points on Tuesday to close below the 22,000 level at 21,919.63 points.

The index has received heavy battering of 838 points in the last three trading sessions: Friday by 216 points; Monday 325 points and Tuesday 297 points. It wiped out the much-talked about post-budget rally of 433 points that had seen the index hit its all-time high at 22,757 points on June 13.

The market participants referred to the pull back as correction, consolidation and profit-taking.

The investors were also concerned by the selling by foreigners in the three days, with the heaviest outflow of $9 million last Friday.

On Tuesday, the market made an effort at recovery in the early hour with the index climbing to day's high at 22,320.46 points, but could not stand up to the selling pressure and capsized by 370 points to touch the day's low at 21,846.18 points. It, however, recovered by around 80 points, in the last hour before close of the market.

The two leading heavy-weight losers were OGDC, which contributed 38 points to the index decline and the MCB Bank which fell by Rs12, pulling the index down by 103 points.

Analysts said that institutional investors booked profit at high levels. Investors also decided to shed part of the portfolio ahead of the government's meeting with the IMF on June 19 and the announcement of SBP Monetary Policy Statement on June 21.

The figures released by the National Clearing Company of Pakistan in the evening, cheered investors as they reflected the resumption of foreign buying.

On Tuesday, foreign investors bought shares worth a substantial $4.14m. Other big buyers were 'individuals' who picked up shares valued at $1.80m and 'other organisations' with net buy at $0.55m.

Banks and mutual funds were on the sell side offloading $2.67m and $3.87m worth shares, respectively.

Although stocks across the board took the blow on Tuesday, represented by fall in prices of 262 shares against increase in prices of just 89, yet the heavy-weight energy stocks took the brunt of the blow.

Day traders and punters were rocked by the drop in low-priced cement stocks.

The market capitalisation based KSE-30 index dipped by 265.55 points to 17,024.01 points.

Turnover stood down to 347m shares on Tuesday, compared to 378m shares the previous day.

Trading value improved to Rs9.450bn, from Rs8.315bn and the market capitalization decreased y Rs59bn to Rs5.327 trillion, from Rs5.387tr.

The heaviest fall was seen in Bata (Pak) down by Rs70 to Rs1,710 and Nestle Pak recording loss of Rs49.51 to Rs6,599.99. The two big gainers on Tuesday were Colgate Palmolive up by Rs88 to Rs1,883 followed by Unilever Food higher by Rs38 to Rs4,800.On the ten-top traded list, Bank of Punjab (right issue) dipped by 99 paisa or ‘lower lock’ to Rs2.79 on 62m shares. Fauji Cement rose 19 paisa to Rs13.26 on 29m shares; Lafarge Pakistan was up by 12 paisa to Rs9.19 on 29m shares; Bank Al-Falah slipped by 89 paisa to Rs18.05 on 19m shares; Maple Leaf Cement declined 38 paisa to Rs23.82 on 17m shares; Bank of Punjab dipped 62 paisa to Rs14.12; PTCL was lower by 24 paisa to Rs22 on 14m shares; Wateen Telecom up by 12 paisa to Rs4.63 on 11m shares; Jah Sidd Co easy by 29 paisa to Rs13.84 on 9m shares and Flying Cement pushed higher by one paisa to Rs5.22 on 8m shares.