KARACHI: The panic prone investors started trading on Friday with flurry of sell orders, haunted by the bloodbath seen a day earlier on the eve of Pakistan’s entry into the MSCI Emerging Markets Index when the KSE-100 index had plunged 3.58 per cent.

The index spiraled downwards by 1,289 points in the early hours on Friday. But attractive valuations and a sense of slowdown in foreign frontier funds sell-off calmed the market, which saw risk takers enter to accumulate positions in value scrips.

At mid-day the index recouped all of the day’s losses and added 135 points. The index managed to close the session in the positive, but the rule of adjusted closing mechanism of last two hours average, led to

a negative close by 225.51points (-0.46pc) at 48,555.30. The decline on Friday took the aggregate five session loss of KSE-100 index to 4,082 points.

The overall market participation on Friday remained on the lower side with 222 million shares traded against 404 shares that changed hands a day earlier.

Intermarket Securities noted the investor focus remained pinned on the MSCI Emerging Markets Index stocks, with maximum traded value witnessed in Engro, HBL and Lucky Cement.

Major contribution to downside came from OGDC which fell 3.35pc, HBL 1.61pc, UBL 1.57pc, Engro 1.68pc and SNGPL 2.40pc.

On the other side, BAHL gained 3.87pc, K-Electric 4.47pc and NBP 2.29pc.

“The early pressure in the market was on the back of likely redemptions in mutual funds,” opined analysts at JS Global.

They noted that the cement sector closed lower by 0.30pc over the earlier day, while mixed sentiment were witnessed in the steel sector.

Published in Dawn, June 3rd, 2017