KARACHI: The stock market suffered a bearish momentum in the first half of the trading session on Friday on the back of inflationary and political concerns.

The political temperature was high in anticipation of the election of the Punjab chief minister.

However, the bulls made a comeback in the latter part as investors resorted to value hunting across the board, pushing the benchmark back into the green zone, said Arif Habib Ltd.

Main-board volumes continued to remain dull, although decent volumes were observed in third-tier stocks, it added.

JS Global asked investors to “stay cautious” and consider the current downside as a buying opportunity in blue-chip stocks.

As a result, the KSE-100 index settled at 40,077.30 points, up 245.55 points or 0.62 per cent from a day ago.

The trading volume increased 8.4pc to 171.2 million shares while the traded value went up 10.5pc to $20.7m on a day-on-day basis.

Stocks contributing significantly to the traded volume included WorldCall Telecom Ltd (19.98m shares), Unity Foods Ltd (18.96m shares), TPL Properties Ltd (16.81m shares), Fauji Fertiliser Bin Qasim Ltd (9.29m shares) and Cnergyico PK Ltd (7.13m shares).

Sectors contributing to the index performance included fertiliser (83.2 points), technology (70.5 points), chemical (30.2 points), exploration and production (27.6 points) and cement (26.9 points).

Shares registering the highest gains in percentage terms were Premier Insurance Ltd (25pc), SME Leasing Ltd (24.5pc), First Prudential Modaraba (18pc), Jubilee Spinning and Weaving Mills Ltd (17.65pc) and Safe Mix Concrete Ltd (14.29pc).

Stocks that recorded the biggest losses in percentage terms were First IBL Modaraba Ltd (9.27pc), United Insurance Company of Pakistan Ltd (7.71pc), Sunrays Textile Mills Ltd (7.5pc), 786 Investments Ltd (7.19pc) and KASB Modaraba (6.67pc).

Foreign investors were net buyers as they purchased shares worth $0.34m.

Published in Dawn, July 23rd, 2022