KARACHI: The benchmark KSE-100 Index continued its bullish trend throughout the session, as the international oil prices fell near 100/bbl. The index continued with the positive trend, as it touched an intraday high of 42,983 but eventually settled to close at 42,717, gaining 259 points, analysts said on Thursday.
An analyst at Pearl Securities said the momentum was also built up in the power sector as the Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) of the Cabinet approved Rs149 billion to be paid to the independent power producers (IPPs) in FY22.
“Further, the government signed another loan facility agreement with China worth $2.3 billion, which further fuelled the market sentiment. However, profit-taking was initiated in the last hours of the session, owing to the expected rise in the upcoming inflation figures.”
The Pakistan Stock Exchange KSE-100 shares Index gained 0.61 per cent, or 258.83 points, to close at 42,716.97 points. The KSE-30 shares gained 0.58 per cent, or 94.55 points, to close at 16,353.22 points.
As many as 347 scrips were active, of which 235 advanced, 87 declined and 25 remained unchanged. The ready market volumes stood at 349.48 million shares, compared with the turnover of 266 million shares in the last trading session.
The major volume leaders of the day included Cnergy with a turnover of 37 million shares, Pakistan Refinery Limited (PRL) with 29 million shares and K-Electric with 28 million shares.
Ahsan Mehanti at Arif Habib Corporation said that the stocks showed a sharp recovery on record rupee recovery after the announcement of $2.3 billion loan agreement with the Chinese banks consortium and progress over resumption of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) bailout programme.
“The ECC approval of over Rs149 billion in IPPs payments and strong economic outlook, amid imminent IMF accord played a catalytic role in the bullish close.”
Going forward, analysts expect the market to remain in the green zone, as the rupee has also started to make quick recovery against the dollar to hover at 208/dollar, coupled with other positive inflows from the IMF.
