KARACHI: The first day of change in circuit breakers to 5.50 per cent from 5pc was put to test on Monday when the stocks tumbled with number of shares hitting their new lower lock.

The KSE-100 index started out on a positive note and took off to its intraday high 135 points, before giving in to selling pressure that kept mounting for rest of the session. It tanked to intraday low at 535 points, before showing some recovery in the last hour and finish trading with loss of 420.14 points (0.97pc) at 42,747.62.

Participants, mostly institutions, decided to take profit on subtle signs of early called Financial Action Task Force (FATF) working group session in Beijing where Pakistan was reported to be gearing up for three-day meeting with the global money laundering watchdog, starting from January 21.

On the macro side, pending increase in gas prices by Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) kept investors cautious. Its decision to reduce Gas Infrastr­ucture Develop­ment Cess with the aim of cutting down urea price per bag received mixed response from the fertiliser stocks where Engro Corp and Fertiliser closed lower, while Fauji Fertiliser and Bin Qasim showed positive price performance.

The issues on domestic political scene remained unsettled as the ruling political party and its coalition partners could not reach an agreement.

The volume declined 18pc to 173.9 million shares, from 211.4m, led by Engro Fertilisers, TRG Pakistan, Bank of Punjab, Wordlcall Telecom and Summit Bank, which formed 33pc of the aggregate. Traded value increased by 12pcto $45.6m as against $40.7m in the previous session.

Sectors contributing to the negative performance included banks, lower by 129 points, fertiliser 78 points, cement 51 points and investment banks 37 points.

Meanwhile scrips which pulled down the index were Engro Corporation, decreasing by 3.3pc, Engro Fert­ilisers 5.5pc, United Bank 2pc, Habib Bank 1.3pc, Dawood Hercules 2.8pc, Pakistan Petroleum 1.1pc and Lucky Cement 1.2pc.

Published in Dawn, January 21st, 2020