KARACHI: The Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) saw fresh selling pressure on Thursday due to growing political tensions surrounding the proposed 26th constitutional amendment, which caused the index to drop below 86,000 due to aggressive foreign selling. The previous day, the SCO summit had helped the PSX reach an all-time high.
According to Arif Habib Corporation’s Ahsan Mehanti, political noise caused equities to close due to anxiety on the outcome of judicial changes and foreign outflows.
He pointed out that investor mood was badly affected by government moves on IPP payment and tariff difficulties, low global crude oil prices, and delays in privatizing state-owned firms.
According to Topline Securities Ltd., the banking and E&P sectors saw profit-taking as they lost value and contributed 348 points to the index’s decline.
The KSE 100 index saw a low of 85,539.20 and a high of 86,520.29 over the same day. Nevertheless, the index lost 620.23 points, or 0.72 percent, on a daily basis before settling at 85,585.43.
Nonetheless, the traded value decreased 19.78% to Rs21.61bn, while the trading volume increased 8.21 percent to 513.28 million shares.
The Searle Company (30.39 million shares), Pakistan Refinery (57.82 million shares), Fauji Foods (57.32 million shares), Pak International Bulk Terminal (18.86 million shares), and Pace Pakistan (17.53 million shares) were among the stocks that made up a substantial portion of the traded volume.
Hallmark Company Ltd. (Rs79.66), Rafhan Maize (Rs73.02), Siemens Pakistan (Rs63.22), Indus Motor (Rs42.85), and Premium Textile (Rs28.82) were the shares showing the biggest increases in price in absolute terms.
Nestle Pakistan (Rs100.00), Ismail Industries (Rs86.63), Service Industries (Rs32.40), Sapphire Textile (Rs16.33), and Pakistan Oilfields (Rs14.11) were the firms whose share prices dropped significantly.
Foreign investors continued to be net sellers, offloading $4.81 million worth of shares, while mutual funds and banks became net buys, purchasing shares valued at $1.58 million and $3.65 million, respectively.
