KARACHI: Pakistan Stock Exchange Thursday witnessed a bullish trend on the back of healthy buying, mainly by local investors and institutions.

BRIndex100 gained 75.06 points or 1.79 percent to close at 4,261.45 points. BRIndex100 hit intraday high of 4,273.57 and intraday low of 4,187.29 points. Volumes stood at 342.525 million shares.

BRIndex30 increased by 469.98 points or 2.24 percent to close at 21,496.23 points with a turnover of 260.547 million shares. The KSE-100 Index surged by 653.49 points or 1.62 percent to close above 41,000 level at 41,031.03 points. Trading activity also improved significantly as daily volumes on the ready counter increased to 389.193 million shares as compared to 241.946 million shares traded on Wednesday.

Foreign investors however remained on the selling side and withdrew $4.064 million from Pakistan capital market. Total market capitalization increased by Rs 92 billion to Rs 7.539 trillion. Out of total 405 active scrips, 304 closed in positive and only 74 in negative while the value of 27 stocks remained unchanged.

Unity Foods was the volume leader with 50.024 million shares and increased by Rs 1.65 to close at Rs 24.84 followed by TRG Pak that surged by Rs 3.07 to close at Rs 58.25 with 33.254 million shares. Rafhan Maize and Indus Dyeing were the top gainers increasing by Rs 89.00 and Rs 36.97 respectively to close at Rs 8400.00 and Rs 533.89 while Island Textile and Philip Morris Pak were the top losers declining by Rs 125.00 and Rs 33.99 respectively to close at Rs 1600.00 and Rs 1465.00.

BR Automobile Assembler Index increased by 108.33 points or 1.42 percent to close at 7,754.29 points with total turnover of 5.608 million shares.

BR Cement Index surged by 215.05 points or 3.8 percent to close at 5,878.41 points with 65.061 million shares.

BR Commercial Banks Index gained 54.99 points or 0.65 percent to close at 8,504.05 points with 13.072 million shares.

BR Power Generation and Distribution Index inched up by 78.77 points or 1.65 percent to close at 4,866.76 points with 8.803 million shares.

BR Oil and Gas Index added 63.84 points or 1.67 percent to close at 3,887.94 points with 34.896 million shares.

BR Tech. & Comm. Index closed at 2,029.01 points, up 59.88 points or 3.04 percent with 67.457 million shares.

Ahsan Mehanti at Arif Habib Corporation said that bullish trend continued amid surging global crude oil prices, global equities and speculations on likely subdued CPI inflation for November 2020.

"Reports of over $100 million receipt in the Roshan Pakistan digital accounts, SBP policy on status quo in the policy rates, and rupee recovery played a catalyst role in bullish close," he added.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2020