Indian ‘surgical strike’ hits its own stock exchange

ISLAMABAD: Despite New Delhi’s shameless lies spread about having conducted a surgical strike against Pakistan to boost the morale of its people after Uri embarrassment, the Indian stock market on Thursday showed a greater loss as against Pakistan’s whose market activity was better than the average.

The shameless and baseless Indian propaganda should have boosted the morale of its investors but it did not work and the stock market in India showed greater losses on Thursday.

As against India, the Pakistani stock market, which should have been severely affected as Pakistan on Thursday woke up with the aggressively unleashed Indian propaganda, showed great resilience. Market activity was greater than the average for this year.

According to the Security and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) sources, two very different reactions were witnessed in the stock markets of Pakistan and India in the wake of India’s crossborder firing at the Line of Control, which was dubbed “surgical strikes” by the Indian forces.

The KSE-100 Index closed at 40,295 points with a minor decrease of 59 points or a mere 0.15 percent.Compared to the 0.15 percent decline in the KSE-100 index, India’s BSE (Bombay
 India’s BSE (Bombay Stock Exchange) Sensex index shed 1.64 percent demonstrating the negative sentiment created by the Indian aggression.

Further, the SECP sources said, India’s NSE (National Stock Exchange of India) Nifty index fell by 1.7 percent. While the losses in index show the negative sentiment in India, the effect of Indian aggression on stock market capitalisation was even greater.

It is added that market capitalisation at India’s BSE declined by 2.2 percent compared to a 0.16 percent drop at the Pakistan Stock Exchange.

Interestingly, all regional markets including those in Malaysia and Hong Kong remained unaffected, dismissing the Indian boasting about “surgical strikes.” Further, at PSX (Pakistan Stock Exchange), a healthy turnover of Rs21.4 billion and 712 million shares was observed, which are well above the average activity during 2016.

The fact that buyers were willing to purchase shares at PSX despite the threats and claims by India shows that investors have confidence in Pakistan and its economy.

The Times of India, Thursday reported that stocks reeled under huge losses on Thursday as benchmark Sensex plunged sharply by over 465 points, the biggest single-day fall in three months, after India carried out “surgical strikes" last night on terror launchpads across LoC.

It added that the Indian rupee too was in the line of fire, down 49 paise (intra-day) against the US dollar, to trade at 66.95.

The Indian media added that the stocks started off higher extending Wednesday’s recovery, but suffered a jolt after announcement that India conducted surgical strikes last night on terror pads across the Line of Control.

“The (Indian) Army's announcement triggered all round selling, sending the Sensex into a tizzy, which broke below the key 28,000-mark. It settled at 27,827.53, down 465.28 points, or 1.64 percent -- its biggest single-day fall since June 24 and weakest closing since August 26 when it closed at 27,782.25,” the newspaper reported.

It was added that mood turned cautious after the Army said the surgical offensive last night came on "very specific and credible information" about Pakistan-based terrorists being pushed into Indian territory for carrying out strikes in Jammu and Kashmir and various cities in India.