KARACHI: Overcoming dismal sentiments from the previous night, the stock market rebounded strongly on Monday, helped by robust foreign buying, suggesting that investor confidence in the country’s economic future has strengthened.
As investors considered the World Bank’s approval of a $149.7 million project financing and the release of $1.1 billion early next month as a result of the Staff-Level Agreement reached last week under the current $3 billion Stand-By Agreement, which would also open the door for inflows from other lenders and friendly nations, Ahsan Mehanti of Arif Habib Corporation said that stocks showed a strong recovery.
According to him, active buying was also fueled by the $128 million current account surplus in February, rising crude oil prices globally, and a stable currency.
Topline Securities Ltd. stated that following reports of the government’s plan to seek investments from friendly nations for the country’s largest hydrocarbon explorer, the oil and exploration sector led the market gains. As a result, buying interest was shown in Oil and Gas Development Company Ltd and Pakistan Petroleum Ltd, which caused their scrips’ prices to rise by 2.90 percent and 1.66 percent, respectively.
The sectors of banking, E&P, power, and fertilizer all made major contributions to the index’s increase.
Consequently, the KSE-100 index ended the day at 65,525.65, up 373.82 points, or 0.57%, from the previous trading session.
The total number of shares traded increased by 25.32 percent to 261.19 million. On a daily basis, the transacted value increased by 36.76 percent to Rs7.14 billion.
Pakistan Telecommunication Company Ltd. (27.17 million shares), Hascol Petroleum Ltd. (21.37 million shares), K-Electric (20.91 million shares), Oil and Gas Development Company Ltd. (16.00 million shares), and Pak Reinsurance Ltd. (15.02 million shares) were among the stocks that made up a substantial portion of the traded volume.
Nestle Pakistan Ltd. (Rs200.00), Sapphire Fibres Ltd. (Rs24.39), Siemens Pakistan Engineering Ltd. (Rs14.00), Lucky Core Industries (Rs12.08), and Baluchistan Wheels Ltd. (Rs9.98) were the shares showing the largest rises in their share prices in absolute terms.
Rafhan Maize Products Company Ltd (Rs199.89), Sapphire Textile Mills Ltd (Rs45.17), Pakistan Engineering Company Ltd (Rs30.64), Al-Ghazi Tractors Ltd (Rs27.60), and Service Industries Textile Ltd (Rs18.55) were the companies with the largest absolute declines in share prices.
Foreign purchasers continued to be net buys, having bought $3.09 million worth of shares.
