The Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) suspended trade for two hours after the market fell over 5% to a multi-year low below 27,500 points in intra-day trading on Wednesday.

The market failed to arrest the free fall despite the government announcing a financial support package worth Rs 1.2 trillion and cut the key interest rate by a significant 150 basis points to 11% in an emergency meeting to support businesses and counter the coronavirus pandemic uncertainty on Tuesday.

Furthermore The KSE-100 index – a benchmark for market performance – was down 1,270.05 points or 4.45% to stand around 27,294.78.

This is for the sixth time the automated trade halt mechanism has triggered in the past seven sessions at PSX.