KARACHI: Share prices fell sharply in the second half of Friday’s trading session on the Pakistan Stock Exchange amid pressure emanating from pre-poll uncertainty.
Arif Habib Corporation Ltd analyst Ahsan Mehanti said investors remained concerned about rising industrial power tariff, which is being implemented to end the power sector’s circular debt crisis. Moreover, high leverage at a steep financing rate also played the role of a catalyst in the bearish close.
Topline Securities Ltd said Friday’s losses resulted in the KSE-100 index declining 6.7 per cent on a weekly basis, marking the second consecutive week of the index fall. It attributed this decline to profit-taking by institutional investors as well as selling by individual clients to meet margin requirements against their leveraged positions. As many as 77 of the KSE-100 constituents took a dip while 22 saw an uptick in the week’s last trading session.
As a result, the KSE-100 index closed at 61,705.09 points after losing 988.47 points or 1.58pc from the preceding session.
The overall trading volume decreased 17.3pc to 671.5 million shares. The traded value decreased 17.8pc to Rs13.7 billion on a day-on-day basis.
Stocks contributing significantly to the traded volume included K-Electric Ltd (113.9m shares), Fauji Foods Ltd (85.9m shares), Cynergyico PK Ltd (70m shares), WorldCall Telecom Ltd (40.9m shares) and Kohinoor Spinning Mills Ltd (38.7m shares).
Companies registering the biggest increases in their share prices in absolute terms were Sapphire Textile Mills Ltd (Rs20), Shield Corporation Ltd (Rs19.99), Hoechst Pakistan Ltd (Rs15.81), Pakistan Cables Ltd (Rs8.61) and Khyber Tobacco Company Ltd (Rs8.44).
Companies registering the biggest decreases in their share prices in absolute terms were Sapphire Fibres Ltd (Rs118.12), Pakistan Tobacco Company Ltd (Rs44.86), Mari Petroleum Company Ltd (Rs32.68), Murree Brewery Company Ltd (Rs13.42) and National refinery Ltd (Rs12.18).
Foreign investors were net sellers as they offloaded shares worth $0.21m.
Published in Dawn, December 23rd, 2023
