KARACHI: The Pakistan stocks closed on a negative note on Tuesday due to the significant hike in the policy rate besides depleting forex exchange reserves of the country.
The KSE-100 Index opened negative and witnessed a volatile session throughout the day due to concerns over declining foreign reserves and an increase of 150 basis point in the policy rate, an analyst at Arif Habib Limited said.
“The market continued to remain under pressure where the investors opted to remain on the sideline until further clarity on the political as well as the economic front,” he added.
The Pakistan Stock Exchange KSE-100 shares Index shed 1.15 per cent, or 498.93 points, to close at 41,950.32 points. The KSE-30 shares Index shed 1.18 per cent, or 190.34 points, to close at 15,902.60 points.
As many as 318 scrips were active of which 94 advanced, 208 declined and 16 remained unchanged.
The ready market volumes stood at 169.70 million shares, compared with the turnover of 118.98 million shares in the last trading session.
An analyst at Topline Securities said that the market closed on a red mark over the ambiguity regarding the International Monetary Fund (IMF) programme, unstable political conditions in the country and secondary market yield which kept the investors remain under pressure.
The companies which reflected the highest gains included Sapphire Textiles up Rs34.15 to close at Rs1,038.70/share, Gatron Industries up Rs27.99 to close at Rs434.99/share.
The companies which reflected the most losses included Rafhan Maize down Rs100 to close at Rs9,800/share, and Sanofi-Aventis down Rs49.79 to close at Rs800.21/share.
The highest volumes were witnessed in Pak Refinery with a turnover of 15.73 million shares. The scrip gained 46 paisa to close at Rs15.74/share, followed by Silk Bank Ltd with a turnover of 14.66 million shares. It gained 7 paisas to close at Rs1.39/share. TPL Properties remained the third with a turnover of 10.60 million shares. It gained 38 paisas to finish at Rs15.49/share.