Stocks retreat, fall below historic 54,000-mark

KARACHI: The Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) on Tuesday jumped to a historic high — shooting past 54,000 points — but dropped at close, ending its days-long winning streak.

The KSE-100 index touched its all-time high of 54,278 — in line with its winning streak — after the opening bell. However, profit-taking pulled the market down and it lost 124.63 points or 0.23% to close at 53,735.73 points, down from yesterday's close of 53,860.36 points.

Experts had attributed the bullish movement to positive macroeconomic indicators and hopes of a good outcome from ongoing talks with the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

Pakistan-Kuwait Head of Research, Samiullah Tariq, told Geo.tv: "Expectations of monetary policy's rate cut and the strong profitability of the companies are among the driving forces that shored up the KSE-100."

The increase was also driven by the announcement of the general elections as investors hoped for the much-needed political stability in the country.

The IMF’s review mission is in Pakistan currently to complete the first review under the $3 billion loan programme and the possibility of releasing the second tranche of $700 million by the end of December 2023.

The tranche would go through if both sides can strike a staff-level agreement at the end of the talks.

Overall trading volumes decreased to 506.07 million shares compared with Monday's tally of 546.54 million. The value of shares traded during the day was Rs18.25 billion.

Shares of 365 companies were traded. Of these, 125 stocks closed higher, 220 fell and 20 remained unchanged.

Cnergyico PK was the volume leader trading in 50.4 million shares, gaining Rs0.04 to close at Rs4.15. It was followed by Pak Refinery with 36.2 million shares, losing Rs1.63 to close at Rs21.67 and Kohinoor Spining with 34.7 million shares, losing Rs0.2 to close at Rs2.33.