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Stocks rally as tidings on Chinese, Saudi bailouts cheered

By Our Correspondent
November 16, 2018

Stocks rallied on Thursday, borrowing strength form Saudi Arabian envoy’s statement that Riyadh was set to release the agreed $3 billion in financial assistance to Pakistan shortly, giving investors a leg to stand on, amid easing crude prices, dealers said.

Topline Securities said the market also cheered the report that quoted Zhao Lijian, Deputy Head of Mission at Chinese Embassy, telling a select group of reporters that modalities of Beijing’s assistance to Pakistan were being worked out mutually and experts from both sides were in contact to formalise the details of the new package.

Adil Ghaffar, chief executive officer of First Equity Modaraba, said crude oil prices, internationally, paused to digest, after the longest losing streak on record. “The spotlight now turned to international crude oil inventory where increasing stockpiles were witnessed. This stockpile might dictate a selloff to resume,” Ghaffar added.

Pakistan Stock Exchange’s (PSX) benchmark KSE-100 Shares Index gained 1.06 percent or 464.58 points to close at 41,428.63 points level, while KSE-30 Shares Index followed strengthened by 1.21 percent or 236.10 points to end at 19,807.39 points level.

In today’s session, the number of active scrips was 387 and out of this total 250 moved up, 121 retreated, and 16 remained unchanged. The ready market volumes stood at 254.905 billion shares, as compared with the turnover of 255.170 billion shares in the previous session.

Murtaza Jaffar, analyst from Elixir Securities, said investors cheered the decline in international coal prices to $90.70/ton as active buying was witnessed in cement sector.

“Ghandhara Nissan recorded a strong gain after company notified the Exchange of launch of CKD Models of Renault trucks in Pakistan to capture the rising transportation demand on the back of CPEC transportation,” Jaffar added. Contribution arrived from all the key sectors because in the last three days it underwent heavy selling and gave room for some appreciation. Oil and gas exploration and marketing companies posted healthy gains on the reports that global crude oil prices have been reverted.

Moreover, the stocks, which came under fire because of rebalancing executed by MSCI, were also on the buying chart. Honda gained Rs11.52, Lucky Cement by Rs14.52, United Bank Rs6.56 and Maple Leaf Cement Rs0.92. Lucky Cement and United Bank have been removed from emerging market index to small cap index, while Maple Leaf and Honda have been removed from the small cap index. Next review is scheduled for June 2019.

Another factor which gave sigh of relief to the stock players were news circulating that the China and Saudi Arabia have been working on package for Pakistan.

The highest gainers were Colgate Palmolive, up Rs114.76 to close at Rs2410.01/share, and Sanofi-Aventis, up Rs30.65 to finish at Rs932.38/share.

Companies that booked highest losses were Rafhan Maize, down Rs190.00 to close at Rs7200.00/share, and Nestle Pakistan, down Rs170.00 to close at Rs8950.00/share.

TRG Pakistan Limited recorded the highest volumes with a turnover of 17.465 million shares. The scrip gained Rs0.37 to close at Rs30.77/share.

The lowest volumes were witnessed in Askari Life Assurance Co Ltd, recording a turnover of 7.309 million shares, and losing Rs0.95 to end at Rs0.49/share.