KARACHI: Stocks shed value on the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) on Friday, with the KSE-100 index showing a moderate loss of 146.56 points or 0.31 per cent to close at 46,565.29.

While trading remained choppy with the index in search of direction, several factors pushed it to close in the red. These factors included Friday being the last session of the week and the rollover of the future contracts, which led to selling by weak holders.

The volume increased to 236 million shares from 187m shares a day ago. The traded value receded to Rs9.39 billion from Rs12.6bn as investors switched to dealing in low-priced scrips from heavyweight banking and energy stocks that carried the day on Thursday.

The major contribution to total market participation came from K-Electric, NIB Bank and Engro Polymer, which added 67m shares to the total traded volume.

The KSE-100 index closed up 23.24pc in 2016-17 while it was down 2.6pc in Jan-June and down 7.96pc in June alone, said Raza Jafri, director research at Intermarket Securities.

But he pointed out that the PSX was down 8pc only unlike Qatar and UAE markets, which had declined 15pc and 23pc, respectively, after the status upgrade by MSCI.

“If you ignore the first two days of June, the market saw a net buying during the month,” he said.

Major contribution to the downside came from Hub Power Company, which went down 3.52pc, Oil and Gas Development Company 3.07pc, Engro Corporation 2.32pc, Fauji Fertiliser Com­p­any 2.27pc and Dawood Hercules 2.81pc, taking away 220 points from the index.

Habib Bank went up 1.18pc, Hascol Petroleum 5pc and Pakistan Tobacco Company 4.89pc, adding 81 points to the index. From the perspective of sectors, utilities went down 1.73pc, materials 1.19pc and energy 0.86pc.

Published in Dawn, July 1st, 2017