KARACHI: After rallying for three consecutive sessions, the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) on Thursday faltered amid uncertainty about whether the International Monetary Fund would give its go-ahead to the government’s plans for reducing industrial power tariff and energy sector circular debt.

Ahsan Mehanti of Arif Habib Corporation said unconfirmed reports of a row over the proposed circular debt management plan dampened investor sentiments.

However, the caretaker prime minister on Wednesday directed the energy ministry to formulate an effective and durable strategy to do away with the circular debt.

The slashing of cut-off yields by up to 62 basis points for different T-bill tenors kept the banking sector under pressure.

Furthermore, weak auto sector earnings and uncertainty about SBP’s monetary policy direction amid high inflation also played a role in the bearish close.

Topline Securities Ltd said a selling spree was witnessed in energy stocks, especially in Oil and Gas Development Com­pany (OGDCL) and Pakistan Petroleum Ltd (PPL).

Collectively OGDCL, PPL, Bank Alhabib, Hub Power and PSO negatively contributed 510 points to the index. On the flip side, Engro Corporation, Mee­zan Bank and Engro Ferti­lisers added 137 points.

As a result, the KSE-100 index closed at 64,298.01 points after losing 524.43 points or 0.81 per cent from the preceding session.

The overall trading volume dipped 4.01pc to 460.69 million shares. The traded value, however, rose 12.20pc to Rs25.24bn on a day-on-day basis.

Stocks contributing significantly to the traded volume included Oil and Gas Development Company Ltd (49.67m shares), K-Electric (48.97m shares), Hascol Petroleum Ltd (38.80m shares), Pakistan Petroleum Ltd (27.37m shares) and Fauji Fertiliser Bin Qasim Ltd (24.11m shares).

Shares registering the biggest increases in their share prices in absolute terms were Pakistan Tobacco Company Ltd (Rs57.00), Lucky Core Industries Ltd (Rs55.43), Al-Mari Petroleum Ltd (Rs37.45), Faisal Spinning Mills Ltd (Rs17.17) and Bata Pakistan Ltd (Rs15.24).

Companies registering the biggest decreases in their share prices in absolute terms were Rafhan Maize Products Company Ltd(Rs199.98), Philip Morris (Pakistan) Ltd (Rs53.88), Archroma Pakistan Ltd (Rs22.98), Indus Motor Company Ltd (Rs16.76) and Oil and Gas Development Company (Rs9.42).

Foreign investors continued offloading their positions as they disposed of shares worth $6.06m.

Published in Dawn, January 26th, 2024