The Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) saw range-bound trading on Tuesday with the benchmark KSE-100 Index closing marginally lower as investors looked for direction in a charged-up political environment.

In intra-day trading, the benchmark index remained in the positive, hitting an intraday high of 43,400.61 (up 170 points) in the first half of the session. However, profit-taking soon started with the index seeing all its gains erased.

At close, the KSE-100 ended with a drop of 26.43 points, or 0.06%, to settle at 43,203.79.

“Investors opted to invest funds in blue-chip stocks having attractive dividend yield,” said Topline Securities in its post-market comment. “Initially, oil stocks led the show where a recent rally in global oil prices brought them again into investors' radar,” it added.

On the corporate front, Pak Suzuki Motor Company Limited announced its CY21 results, where it posted PAT of Rs2.7 billion alongside an EPS of Rs32.56, as compared to loss of Rs1.4 billion in CY20.

GlaxoSmithKline Consumer reappointed M. Z. Moin Mohajir and Farhan Muhammad Haroon as Chairperson and Chief Executive Officer of GSK Consumer Healthcare Pakistan Limited, respectively, with effect from March 21, 2022.

KSE-100 gains 200 points, but volumes remain low

Sectors dragging the benchmark index lower included banking (25.52 points), oil and gas exploration (24.77 points) and cement (17.70 points).

Volume on the all-share index increased to 138.28 million, from 124.95 million on Monday. The value of shares traded also improved significantly to Rs5 billion from Rs3.93 billion recorded in the previous session.

Treet Corporation was the volume leader with 15.35 million shares, followed by TPL Properties XB with 8.38 million shares, and Pak Elektron (R) with 7.36 million shares.

Shares of 320 companies were traded on Tuesday, of which 155 registered an increase, 143 recorded a fall, and 22 remained unchanged.