Stocks maintain victory march amid volatility, profit-booking

KARACHI: Stocks on Tuesday struggled but maintained their victory march in a turbulent trade as investors withdrew to profit-taking amid shifty sentiments, mainly on account of not-so-attractive corporate earnings results announced by select companies, dealers said on Tuesday.

Shumalia Badar, head of research at Ismail Iqbal Securities, said the market lost steam as participants tried to book profits after the continuous rally set in for the last week; however, most of the cement stocks and Habib Bank Limited (HBL) still managed to perform well because of attractive valuations.

“We expect the market to continue to remain mixed ahead of MSCI semi-annual index review announcement on November 13,” she said.

Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) benchmark KSE-100 Shares Index gained 0.37 percent or 155.27 points to close at 41,609.03 points level, whereas KSE-30 Shares Index followed suit

with an increase of 0.47 percent or 95.29 points to end at 20,163.28 points level.

As many as 386 scrips were active in today’s session, of those 142 moved up, 234 retreated, and 10 remained unchanged.

The ready market volumes stood at 327.806 billion shares, as compared with the turnover of 461.069 billion shares in the previous session.

Ahsan Mehanti from Arif Habib Corporations said stocks closed higher led by selected banking and cement scrips on strong earnings outlook.

“Investor expectations for the early resolution of external account imbalances, stronger financial results in banking sector and speculation on likely continuance of CPEC (China-Pakistan Economic Corridor) projects, and receipt of financial assistance from UAE (United Arab Emirates and China led the market to a bullish close,” Mehanti added.

The benchmark index made a day-low of 41,366 and a day-high of 41,792. Analysts say correction is healthy for the market as it will encourage other investors, who were waiting for some trimming, to enter the market.

Since last five trading sessions the cumulative increase has amounted to 3,895 points or 10 percent following the Saudi Arabia’s pledging $6 billion to help bail out the economy.

Murtaza Jaffar from Elixir Securities said with KSE-100 Index having gained a phenomenal 10 percent in just five trading sessions, they expected market to consolidate in the range of 40,700 to 41,800 levels.

“Any positive developments from Prime Miniter’s visit to China should keep the sentiments alive; however, expectations of $6 billion to $9 billion package from the friendly neighbouring coutntry are now beginning to be priced in,” Murtaza added.

The highest gainers were Wyeth Pakistan Limited, up Rs39.37 to close at Rs1360.00/share, and Khyber Tobacco, up Rs27.85 to finish at Rs584.88/share.

Companies that booked highest losses were Bata Pakistan, down Rs94.81 to close at Rs1801.44/share, and Pakistan Tobacco, down Rs36.90 to close at Rs2302.46/share.

Engro Polymer recorded the highest volumes with a turnover of 18.243 million shares.

The scrip gained Rs0.18 to close at Rs36.64/share.

The lowest volumes were witnessed in Bank of Punjab, recording a turnover of 33.033 million shares, and losing Rs0.12 to end at Rs12.96/share.