KARACHI: The Pakistan stock market remained under pressure throughout the session on Wednesday due to concern regarding the uncertain economic and political situation in the country.
An analyst at Arif Habib Corp said that the benchmark KSE-100 Index witnessed a volatile session as the investor opted to remain on the sideways as rupee continued its free-fall against the dollar.
“The main board volumes remained dry while decent volumes were observed in the third-tier stocks,” he added.
The Pakistan Stock Exchange KSE-100 shares Index gained 0.20 per cent, or 78.59 points, to close at 39,972.64 points. The KSE-30 shares Index gained 0.18 per cent, or 27.06 points, to close at 15,158.09 points.
An analyst at Topline Securities said that the equities closed slightly positive where the KSE-100 Index settled at 39,972 levels.
“Range bound activity was witnessed at the bourse as the Index traded in a range of 492 points while the market made an intraday high of 203 points to 40,097 and a low of 289 points to 39,605,” he added.
As many as 321 scrips were active of which 153 advanced, 141 declined and 27 remained unchanged.
The ready market volumes stood at 121.57 million shares, compared with the turnover of 131.86 million shares in the last trading session.
The companies which reflected the highest gains included Rafhan Maize up Rs110 to close at Rs11,100/share, Premium Textile up Rs50.57 to close at Rs726.90/share.
The companies which reflected the most losses included Bata (Pak) down Rs141.58 to close at Rs2,022/share, and Nestle Pakistan down Rs108.13 to close at Rs5,890/share.
The highest volumes were witnessed in Lotte Chemical with a turnover of 10.21 million shares. The scrip gained Rs1.50 to close at Rs28.50/share, followed by WorldCall Telecom with a turnover of 9.26 million shares. It shed 2 paisas to close at Rs1.18/share. TPL Properties remained the third with a turnover of 9.01 million shares. It shed 5 paisas to finish at Rs17.27/share.