KARACHI: The Pakistan stocks witnessed a bull run on the first day of the month, crossing the psychological barrier of 47,000 points, as the government is confidently hoping for a positive result on the agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), analysts said on Monday.

“Additionally, the rupee strengthened against the dollar and coal prices fell down to their previous levels, which triggered the major interest in the cement sector,” an analyst at Pearl Securities said.

The KSE-100 Index closed at 46,975 points as against 46,185 points, showing an increase of 790 points, or 1.7 per cent. Volumes increased from 270.4 million shares to 430 million shares, up 59 per cent.

An analyst said bullish momentum was witnessed in the first-half of the session, as the index made an intraday high of 1,059 points due to appreciation in the rupee value, downturn of commodities price cycle and ease of political noise.

“Cyclicals (cement and steel) sectors contributed the most in the bull-run. After making an intraday high, [the] investors opted for profit-booking after CPI [Consumer Price Index] for the month of October 2021 clocked-in at 9.19 per cent against [the] market expectation of 8.5 per cent.”

It brought the net gains to reach 761 points at the end of the session. Expectation of interest rate hike by the central bank in the upcoming monetary policy announcement caused profit-booking in cyclical stocks and accumulation in the banking stocks.

The stocks that contributed significantly to the volumes included TRG Pakistan, Avanceon Limited, D G Khan Cement, Lucky Cement and Maple Leaf Cement.

“Going forward, we expect the market to remain positive ahead of the Pakistan-IMF review and improving economic figures. Therefore, we recommend our investors to adopt a buy on dip strategy in the ongoing week,” the Pearl Securities analyst said.