KARACHI: The Pakistan equity market started the week by losing 310 points, as ICIJ revealed Pandora Papers in which a massive trove of private financial records was named, labelling national and international personalities, including cabinet members, dealer said on Monday.
“Later, recovery was witnessed at the bourse where the market got ahead to close in the green territory, as Pakistan and IMF [International Monetary Fund] are set to resume talks for the revival of a $6 billion disrupted programme next week,” an analyst at Pearl Securities said.
The Pakistan Stock Exchange KSE-100 shares index gained 0.39 per cent, or 172.8 points, to close at 45,044.50 points. The KSE-30 shares index gained 0.43 per cent, or 75.86 points, to close at 17,684.02 points.
As many as 545 scrips were active, of which 348 advanced, 198 declined and five remained unchanged. The ready market volumes stood at 267.2 million shares, compared with the turnover of 267.05 million shares in the last trading session.
Ahsan Mehanti at Arif Habib Corporation said that the stocks showed across-the-board recovery led by scrips ahead of the quarter-end financial results due this week.
“[The] surging global crude oil prices and speculations on likely release of $1 billion IMF EFF [Extended Finance Facility] and $3.6 billion Saudi deferred payment facility played a catalytic role in the bullish close.”
An analyst at Arif Habib Limited said increased foreign outflows due to reclassification of Pakistan from the MSCI Emerging Market to the MSCI Frontier Market in recent sessions put an added pressure on the index.
The outflows from E&P, banks and fertiliser sectors kept the local investors poised for further downside in these sectors.
“Uptick in Netsol, TRG and AVN just prior to [the] commencement of trading in Octopus Digital, helped the index turn green, which was otherwise down 310 points during the session.”
Going forward, the analysts expect the market activities to remain in a volatile zone, amid energy-driven inflation and the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) meeting.
The companies, which reflected the highest gains included Rafhan Maize, up Rs400 to close at Rs10,900/share; and Colgate Palmolive, up Rs100.01 to close at Rs2,400/share.
The companies that reflected the most losses included Sapphire Textile, down Rs78.75 to close at Rs971.25/share; and Bata Pakistan, down Rs63.33 to close at Rs1,700/share.
The highest volumes were witnessed in Telecard Limited with a turnover of 25.6 million shares. The scrip gained Rs1.2 to close at Rs19.19/share; followed by WorldCall Telecom with a turnover of 21.64 million shares. It gained 15 paisas to close at Rs2.93/share. Summit Bank remained the third with a turnover of 14.68 million shares. It gained 34 paisas to finish at Rs2.94.