The Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) maintained its bullish trend as the benchmark KSE-100 Index gained over 1% during trading on Monday.
The KSE-100 gradually gained throughout the session, even pushing the benchmark index to its intra-day high beyond 73,000.
At close, the KSE-100 settled at 72,764.24, up by 862.15 points or 1.2%.
“The market’s positive sentiment can be attributed to recent news indicating a 50-member Saudi team arriving for potential investments in Pakistan, along with expectations of an IMF mission visiting Pakistan this month to discuss a new programme,” brokerage house Topline Securities said in its post-market report.
On Friday, positivity had returned to the PSX amid developments on the privatisation front as the benchmark index closed the day 1.76% higher.
Across-the-board buying was witnessed on Monday in key sectors including automobile assemblers, cement, chemical, commercial banks, oil and gas exploration companies and OMCs. Index-heavy shares including PSO, SNGPL, PPL, and POL settled in the green.
The buying was witnessed as investor sentiment was buoyed by optimism surrounding the potential deal with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and falling inflation figures that renewed hope of a cut in the key policy rate.
In a key development, it was learned that an IMF mission is expected to visit Pakistan this month to discuss a new programme, the lender said on Sunday ahead of Islamabad beginning its annual budget-making process for the next financial year.
Pakistan last month completed a short-term $3 billion programme, which helped stave off sovereign default, but the government of Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has stressed the need for a fresh, longer term programme.
“A mission is expected to visit Pakistan in May to discuss the FY25 budget, policies, and reforms under a potential new programme for the welfare of all Pakistanis,” the IMF said in an emailed response to Reuters.
Globally, Asian stocks rose to their highest in over a year on Monday on renewed bets that the Federal Reserve would most likely ease rates this year, while the yen weakened after a strong surge last week from Tokyo’s suspected currency intervention.
Trading was thin in Asia with Japan out for a holiday, though markets in mainland China got off to an upbeat start after returning from an extended break.
MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan peaked at their highest since February 2023 and last gained 0.53%, while China’s blue-chip index jumped 1.5%.
Meanwhile, the Pakistani rupee remained largely stable, depreciating 0.01% against the US dollar in the inter-bank market on Monday. At close, the local unit settled at 278.24, a loss of Re0.03 against the greenback, as per the State Bank of Pakistan.
Volume on the all-share index slightly increased to 578.39 million from 437 million a session ago.
The value of shares slightly decreased to Rs24.518 billion from Rs24.542 billion in the previous session.
Pak Petroleum was the volume leader with 48.44 million shares, followed by Fauji Cement with 40.36 million shares, and K-Electric Ltd with 26.77 million shares.
Shares of 389 companies were traded on Monday, of which 258 registered an increase, 108 recorded a fall, while 23 remained unchanged.
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