The Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) remained under pressure on Monday and the KSE-100 declined 0.53% amid lack of investor interest.

Prolonged delay in resumption of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) programme shattered investor sentiment and they rushed to offload their holdings.

At close, the KSE-100 Index settled at 39,835.9, a decrease of 213.75 points or 0.53%.

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Following an upward open, the market traded flat in early hours before selling pressure gripped the KSE-100 Index and it fell. The drop accelerated in final hour and the market ended the session in the red.

Index-heavy cement, chemical, banking and oil spaces saw sell-off and closed with losses.

A report from Arif Habib Limited stated that a mixed session was recorded at the PSX to kick off the business week.

“The market opened in the green zone, but lack of investor involvement drove the index down into the red zone, where it remained for the rest of the trading session, swinging in both directions and eventually closing in the red,” it said. “Investors chose to stay on the sidelines due to the ongoing delay in IMF negotiations.”

Volumes in the mainboard dried up, while third-tier companies continued to dominate the volume board, the report said.

A report from Capital Stake stated that downward trend continued at the PSX on first trading session of the week. Indices swayed in both directions while volumes depreciated from last close, it said.

On the economic front, the remittances sent home by overseas Pakistanis fell by 10.66% year-on-year to $2.5 billion in March 2023. On a month-on-month basis, an increase of 27.41% was recorded.

Sectors painting the benchmark KSE-100 in red included cement (39.03 points), oil and gas exploration (37.16 points) and technology and communication (34.84 points).

Volume on the all-share index dropped to 105.9 million from 135.1 million on Friday while the value of shares traded fell to Rs1.8 billion from Rs3.2 billion recorded in the previous session.

WorldCall Telecom was the volume leader with 34.1 million shares followed by JS Bank with 10.4 million shares and K-Electric Limited with 5.6 million shares.

Shares of 297 companies were traded on Monday, of which 104 registered an increase, 174 recorded a fall and 19 remained unchanged.