KARACHI, Oct 1 Foreign investment in equities rose to $392.5 million in the three months of the current fiscal year, with a net inflow of $154 million in September alone, figures released by the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) on Thursday showed.

The SBP posts the foreign equity investment under the Special Convertible Rupee Account (SCRA).

The stock market data of foreign investment at $225 million slightly differs from the SCRA amount due the difference in methods of compilation.

The SBP statistics released on Thursday were interesting in the sense that while dollars have been flowing mainly from the US and UK, substantial net outflow was recorded by the UAE investors.

In the three months, net inflow from US stood at $182 million; bulk of it amounting to $104 entering the local equity market in September.

Investors in UK bought shares worth $49 million with $41.8 million in September.

Investors in the UAE showed little taste for Pakistani stocks; they stood out as net sellers to the tune of $31 million, but the outflow was seen to have slowed down during September to $0.12 million.

Many stock brokers were not enthused by the splendor of the incoming investment, saying with excess liquidity in the developed world, dollars were flowing freely to the emerging and frontier markets.

A broker asked to compare what the Pakistan equity market had attracted in comparison to regional markets.

Mumbai stock market, for instance, was a destination to $10 billion in foreign portfolio investment during the recent months.

Regulators start

releasing local figures

As a major step forward towards transparency, the National Clearing Company of Pakistan Limited (NCCPL) has started to disburse daily portfolio investment numbers by local investors from Thursday.

Up until now, the clearing company only showed the foreign investors activity during the day The figures pertained to stocks bought; sold and net sale or buy.

“The SECP was refreshing open in accepting our request for disseminating information about local investment as well,” says Mohammad Sohail, CEO at Topline Securities.

It will set at rest, the confusion in certain minds about the actual buyer and seller.

The foreign portfolio investment figures, though helpful, encompassed only a tenth of the total volume of business on any particular day.

Local individuals who command almost 60 per cent share in the volume have historically been major players. However, figures for Thursday's trading showed that local investors were mainly intraday traders.

This was indicated by their gross buying amounting to Rs6,775 million and gross selling at Rs6,779 million, leaving net sale of Rs3.3 million, equivalent to $40,000.

Other figures showed that local companies were net buyers to the tune of Rs85 million or $1m while local funds were the net sellers of Rs260 million or $3.1m worth of equity.

Interpreting the figures, analysts said that foreign investors on Thursday invested $2.1million in equities, while the local funds and individuals were net sellers of an equal amount.