BRIndex100 retreats

Pakistan Stock Exchange Tuesday recovered its overnight losses on the back of healthy buying by both local and foreign investors in various sectors. BRIndex100 gained 77.06 points or 1.7 percent to close at 4,615.73 points. BRIndex100 touched an intraday high of 4,641.72 and an intraday low of 4,538.74 points. Volumes stood at 149.466 million shares.
BRIndex30 increased by 362.83 points or 1.56 percent to close at 23,670.37 points with a turnover of 90.988 million shares. The benchmark KSE-100 index surged by 592.19 points to 42,939.68 points. Trading activity also improved as daily volumes on the ready counter increased to 160.883 million shares as compared to 130.479 million shares traded Monday.
Foreign investors remained net buyers of shares worth $5.7 million. The market capitalization increased by Rs 79 billion to Rs 8.880 trillion. Out of total 357 active scrips, 227 closed in positive, 115 in negative while the value of 15 stocks remained unchanged. P.I.A.C. (A) was the volume leader with 15.752 million shares. It gained Re 0.37 to close at Rs 5.72 followed by Faysal Bank that increased by Re 0.47 to close at Rs 24.19 with 11.661 million shares. Bhanero Textile and Pak Tobacco were the top gainers with Rs 41.97 and Rs 39.92, respectively to close at Rs 881.95 and Rs 2,132.65. Nestle Pakistan and Sanofi-Aventis were the top losers with Rs 399.98 and Rs 52.85, respectively to close at Rs 10,500.02 and Rs 1,342.01.
BR Commercial Banks Index increased by 113.21 points or 1.31 percent to close at 8,746.97 points with total turnover of 20.091 million shares. BR Cement Index surged by 127.32 points or 2.33 percent to close at 5,590.91 points with 22.874 million shares. BR Oil and Gas Index gained 88.5 points or 1.72 percent to close at 5,244.52 points with 12.071 million shares.
BR Tech. & Comm. Index inched up by 3.76 points or 0.34 percent to close at 1,119.11 points with 15.973 million shares. BR Power Generation and Distribution Index closed at 6,268.77 points, up 24.54 points or 0.39 percent with 5.702 million shares. Maaz Mulla at JS Global Capital said that bulls dominated in the trading session on the back of strong participation from local investors, where the index jumped by 592 points, up 1.4 percent to close at 42,940 level. PIAA (up 6.9 percent) led the volume chart with more than 16mn shares exchanging hands on back of the news of privatization process of core business to be completed in accordance with the law before 15th April.
A rally was witnessed in the banking space where big banks boosted the index by 180 points. HBL (up 3.9 percent), MCB (up 2.0 percent), UBL (up 0.9 percent) and BAFL (up 1.2 percent) closed higher than their previous day close. Crude oil prices edged higher in the international market and as a result POL (up 2.6 percent), OGDC (up 2.2 percent) and PPL (up 1.4 percent) from the E&P sector closed in the green trajectory. Investors opted for value buying in the Cement sector where LUCK (up 3.4 percent), PIOC (up 4.5 percent), DGKC (up 1.8 percent) and KOHC (up 2.0 percent) increased the most.
Ahsan Mehanti at Arif Habib Corporation said that stocks closed bullish led by blue chip banking, oil and auto scrips on strong valuations. Higher global equities, foreign inflows, upbeat data on cement sales for December 2017, surging global crude oil prices and revision in local auto prices led earnings season rally. He said up-beat data on auto sales, exports for December 2017 played a catalyst role in record recovery at PSX.