KARACHI: Pakistan Stock Exchange witnessed bullish trend during the outgoing week ended on July 21, 2023 on the back of fresh buying by both local and foreign investors.

The benchmark KSE-100 index surged by 852.75 points on week-on-week basis and closed at 45,920.73 points. Trading activities however remained low as average daily volumes on ready counter decreased by 19.0 percent to 356.80 million shares as compared to previous week’s average of 440.45 million shares while average daily traded value on ready counter declined by 26.5 percent to Rs 9.12 billion against previous week’s Rs 12.41 billion.

BRIndex100 added 53.57 points during this week to close at 4,643.28 points with average daily turnover of 91.311 million shares.

BRIndex30 increased by 166.80 points on week-on-week basis and crossed 16,000 level to close at 16,109.33 points with average daily trading volumes of 72.244 million shares.

The foreign investors remained net buyers of shares worth $5.402 million. Total market capitalization increased by Rs 91 billion during this week to stand at Rs 6.963 trillion.

An analyst at JS Global Capital said that the week started on a dull note but investor optimism eventually picked up. The KSE-100 index closed the week at 45,921, up 853 points WoW.

Sector-wise, banks (up 7.2 percent), transport (up 2.6 percent) and OMC Sector (up 2.2 percent) outperformed during the week.

An analyst at Arif Habib Limited said that the local bourse opened on a negative note on Monday due to profit-taking witnessed by the investors. Moreover, the country report released by the IMF hinted at keeping the monetary policy tight, dividing the market sentiments regarding interest rates in upcoming policies. However, on Wednesday bulls took over, given Pakistan posted a fourth consecutive monthly Current Account Surplus of $334 million in June 2023.

In addition, an announcement of $600million rollover from China further boosted investors’ confidence. The SBP’s reserves (as of 14th July 2023) climbed up to $8.7billion (up by $4.2billion WoW), a level last seen during October 2022, owing to substantial inflows from IMF, KSA, and UAE.

The market participants welcomed the jump in SBP reserves, causing the market to cross the 46,000 points level during intraday on Friday (previously witnessed on 25th April 2022).

Sector-wise positive contributions came from Banks (up 768 points), E&Ps (up 95 points), food & personal care (up 24points) and OMCs (up 22 points). Whereas, the sector which contributed negatively were pharma (down 33 points), fertilizer (down 28 points) and miscellaneous (down 19 points).

Scrip-wise positive contributors were UBL (up 308 points), MCB (up 126 points), MEBL (up 85points), BAHL (up 80 points) and POL (up 69points). Meanwhile, scrip-wise negative contributions came from ENGRO (down 31 points), SYS (down 15points), CHCC (down 15points), PSEL (down 14 points) and HINOON (down 12 points).

Foreigner buying continued during the week, settling at $5.4 million compared to a net buy of $1.0 million last week. Major buying was witnessed in banks ($2.2million) and E&P ($1.2 million).

On the local front, selling was reported by mutual funds ($5.8 million) followed by other organizations ($1.9 million).

Copyright Business Recorder, 2023

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