The bazaar has spoken. Following its knee-jerk reaction (of negative 848 points) to Brexit last Friday, the KSE-100 extended that slide by 350 points last Monday. But that's that. The benchmark has already recovered more than 60 percent of those losses since then. This bargain hunting pretty much settles the question whether the stock market will actually be affected by it.
Earlier this week, Dr Hafiz Pasha rightly highlighted how Brexit would affect Pakistan's export to UK and EU due to currency movement. He also cautioned that Pakistan might not get full advantage of the GSP Plus status, and warned against "unavoidable negative impact" on remittances, and FDI flows and "possible cut" in aid flows from the UK.
All these factors could surely affect the broader economy, but not the stock market. As this column highlighted in this space last Monday, the local stock market is somewhat insulated from textile export troubles. Likewise equities have hardly ever (euphemism for: never) reacted to remittance or aid data. And that's because this market doesn't really represent the economy as many other markets elsewhere do, but that's a different discussion altogether.
FDI inflows, especially if they are related to a listed firm, do boost sentiments, and have an impact. But with the promises of CPEC, there are very few who are concerned about possible slide in FDI from UK, which has been weak in recent years anyways.
With Eid holidays around the corner, market volume may remain dull and the movement weak-to-flat. In the last five out of six Ramadans since calendar year 2010, the KSE-100 has witnessed decline in volume compared to volumes in the Gregorian month immediately preceding the month in which Ramadan falls. And this year is no different. Average Ramadan volume has dropped to 111 million, from about 147 million in May 2016.
However, in line with historical trends, the volumes should get back after the long holiday season ends. With focus on MSCI and CPEC, the time is to be merry and capitalise on lower values should the market find some correction till around 35,000 to 35,500 points. Everybody needs a breather; and the bulls are humans too!
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