Heightened political noise again took a toll on the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) as the benchmark KSE-100 lost nearly 1,150 points during trading on Friday.
The KSE-100 witnessed a negative trend since start of the session, which largely continued till end of the day, taking the index below 60,000 after 7 weeks.
At close, the benchmark index settled at 59,872.96, down by 1,147.10 points or 1.88%.
Index-heavy sectors including OGDC, PPL, Pak Refinery and PSO traded deep in the red.
“Uncertainty on formation of a new coalition is forcing leveraged players to trim their position,” Mohammed Sohail, CEO at Topline Securities, told Business Recorder via message.
On Thursday, rising political volatility had also irked sentiment as the benchmark KSE-100 lost over 1.8% to settle at 61,020.06, a decrease of 1,133.79 points.
The stock market has been under pressure for days now with delay in the results of General Elections 2024 coupled with allegations of rigging causing uncertainty. Additionally, the formation of a coalition government also seemed to be far off with political parties currently scrambling to secure support.
On the political front, the Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) held a press conference in Islamabad today (Friday) where it presented “original and signed Forms-45 as proof of extensive electoral fraud in compilation” of the election results.
PTI claims it had secured an absolute majority in the general elections, but the results were allegedly changed later when Forms 47 were issued.
This announcement comes after the party announced to hold “peaceful” protests across the country on Saturday against alleged rigging in the 2024 general elections held on February 8.
Meanwhile, the caretaker federal cabinet on Thursday approved an increase in gas prices for various sectors with an expected highest increase in gas tariff for domestic consumers.
Globally, Indian shares opened higher on Friday, after rising in the last three sessions, aided by sustained domestic buying, and in line with the rise in Asian peers after fresh US data signalled a cooling economy.
The Pakistani rupee saw a slight improvement as it appreciated 0.01% against the US dollar in the inter-bank market on Friday. At close, the local unit settled at 279.36 after a gain of Re0.02 against the greenback, as per the State Bank of Pakistan.
Volume on the all-share index decreased to 314.2 million from 345.1 million a session ago.
The value of shares increased to Rs12.24 billion from Rs11.87 billion in the previous session.
K-Electric Ltd was the volume leader with 41.83 million shares, followed by WorldCall Telecom with 25.77 million shares, and Oil & Gas Dev. with 20.69 million shares.
Shares of 331 companies were traded on Friday, of which 77 registered an increase, 238 recorded a fall, while 16 remained unchanged.