KARACHI, Feb 25: Stocks ended lower on Monday due to profit-taking, but dealers said losses were curtailed towards the end of the trading session as investors bought shares of heavyweight, National Bank of Pakistan (NBP), after it announced a strong growth in earnings.

The KSE 100-share index ended 0.30 per cent, or 53.77 points, lower at 18,020.50 points. It traded in a broad range as it made a fresh all-time high at 18,175.77 points and an intra day low at 17,972.62 points.

“The new intra-day high however triggered technical correction on back of institutional offloading, wherein despite leading the volumes PTC stayed red through out the session, along the entire main board thus pushing the index below 18,000, the benchmark underwent an adjustment of almost 225 points from day's high,” said Hasnain Asghar Ali from Escorts Capital Ltd.

Turnover fell to 322.3 million shares, compared with 369m shares traded on Friday and trading value decreased to Rs9.11 billion from Rs9.41bn in the previous trading session. Market capitalisation stood at Rs4.48 trillion from Friday’s Rs4.49tr.

Dealers said investors accumulated shares of NBP as it announced the highest ever cash dividend while unveiling its result for the 2012 and earned a profit after tax of Rs16.2 billion.

But selling in the telecom sector, especially Pakistan Telecommunication Co Ltd, led the index to close in the negative territory.Foreign investors turned into net sellers as they sold shares worth a net $1.15 million on Monday, compared with buying a net $1.91m on Friday, bringing the total net buying for the month at $23.21m.

Individuals were the biggest buyers with equity worth $7.17m but selling by mutual funds worth $6.36m offset the gains.

The biggest gainer was UniLever Food which ended Rs130 higher to close at Rs4,255 followed by UniLever Pakistan which closed Rs31.82 higher at Rs10,550. Colgate Palmolive witnessed the biggest loss as it shed Rs80 to Rs1,520, followed by Clariant Pakistan, which ended Rs14.02 lower at Rs266.39.

The KSE-30 index ended 0.30pc, or 43.97 points, lower at 14,770.09.

Out of the 377 companies traded, the value of 170 increased, 183 decreased while 24 remained unchanged.The telecom sector along with second and third tier shares once again dominated the 10 most active traded stocks: Telecard Limited was the volume leader as it gained 86 paisa to Rs7.96 on turnover of 35.05m shares, National Bank of Pakistan rose Rs1.35 to Rs54.74 on 31.38m shares but PTCL fell 33 paisa to Rs23.64 on turnover of 27.84 million shares.

Jahangir Siddiqui Co Ltd increased by 12 paisa to Rs18.74 on 21.07m shares, Azgard nine hit its upper circuit after gaining 90 paisa to Rs8.59 on 17.57m shares but WorldCall Telecom shed 17 paisa to Rs3.67 on 15.06m shares.

Wateen Telecom Ltd ended 8 paisa lower at Rs4.04 on 12.54m shares, Maple leaf Cement marginally rose 2 paisa to Rs18.96 and Fauji Cement closed 13 paisa lower at Rs7.85 on 8.95m shares.

Engro Foods Ltd also ended on its upper circuit as it gained Rs5.67 to Rs130.47 on 8.18m shares.