Cement leads rally as KSE-100 settles with 2,700-point gain
- Benchmark index settles at 172,399.90
The Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) witnessed a strong bullish session on Friday, led by a rally in the cement sector, with the benchmark KSE-100 Index gaining nearly 2,700 points.
The market maintained positive momentum throughout trading amid aggressive buying across key sectors, pushing the index to an intraday high of 173,093.45, while the session low stood at 170,946.54.
Market talk before the budget announcement suggested that the cement sector would be in the limelight owing to some measures aimed at promoting real estate and construction.
At close, the benchmark index settled at 172,399.90, up by 2,696.30 points or 1.59%
On Thursday, the benchmark KSE-100 Index gained 276.16 points or 0.16% to settle at 169,703.60 points.
Meanwhile, Asian stocks joined a global rally on Friday on hopes a Middle East peace deal may finally materialise.
MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan jumped 3.2%, led by a 7.4% surge in South Korea’s KOSPI. Japan’s Nikkei rose 2.7%.
China’s blue-chip CSI300 rose 1%, while Hong Kong’s Hang Seng gained 1.3%.
Overnight, Wall Street rallied with the three major indexes registering their biggest daily gains since April 8, when the U.S. and Iran agreed to a temporary ceasefire. The Nasdaq jumped 2.5%, helped by expectations of a strong market debut for Musk’s SpaceX.
Meanwhile, the Pakistani rupee gained, appreciating 0.01%, against the US dollar in the inter-bank market on Friday. At close, the local currency settled at 278.32, a gain of Rs0.03 against the greenback
Volume on the all-share index increased to 890.80 million from 771.93 million recorded in the previous close.
The value of shares increased to Rs41.98 billion from Rs27.05 billion in the previous session.
Kohinoor Spining was the volume leader with 57.75 million shares, followed by B.O.Punjab with 52.92 million shares, and Sitara Petroleum with 52.65 million shares.
Shares of 488 companies were traded on Friday, of which 282 registered an increase, 167 recorded a fall, and 39 remained unchanged.
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