KARACHI: Bulls were back with a vengeance on Thursday where the KSE-100 index staged a breakout amid burst of activity. The index surged 825 points (2.02 per cent) to close at 41,558 points.

After spiking 881 points in the first half, the index lost its mojo and started retreating as the court proceeding pertaining to indictment of Nawaz Sharif, his daughter and son-in-law continued amid mixed news flow. However, bulls resurfaced in the final hours and took the index beyond all supply zones despite the much anticipated indictment, analysts at Inter­market Securities said.

Others said that investors were enthused by the reports of a possible week-end meeting with the top officials of the finance ministry where the brokers’ proposals to the bail out the market including the setting up of Rs20bn market support fund would be discussed. The major buying was through the “brokers proprietary trading’ amounting to $4.05m. Many wondered if the fraternity knew something, which others did not. The net buying by brokers helped to absorb much of net foreign selling of $4.35m worth stocks.

The volume increased by 68pc over the previous day to a two-month high at 232m shares while the traded value soared 86pc to Rs11.5bn.

Major contribution to upside came from Engro Corp, which went up 4.55pc, Lucky Cement 4.36pc, PPL 2.68pc, HBL 1.5pc and PSO 3.77pc, adding 266 points.

On the flip side, MCB Bank fell 1.29pc, POL 1.49pc and PAKT 5pc, taking away 62 points. Among sectors, materials, health care and energy outperformed the benchmark index.

Analyst Ahsan Mehanti said stocks closed bullish led by scrips across the board as investors expect strong financial results in oil and cement sectors in the quarter-end earning season.

Published in Dawn, October 20th, 2017