PSX remains bearish on rupee instability

KARACHI: The Pakistan equity market witnessed a roller-coaster ride on Friday with the first session posting impressive gains in the oversold market; however, the second session witnessed correction given free-fall of the local currency, dealers said.

Ahsan Mehanti at Arif Habib Corp said the stocks closed lower on the concerns over sharp rise in the T-bills and PIB bond yields, $32.851 trade deficit for five months, weak global equities and slump in the global crude oil prices.

“[The] rupee instability, regulator’s approval of hike in [the] power tariff and uncertainty ahead of [the] approval over terms of the resumed IMF programme played a catalytic role in [the] bearish close at the bourse.”

The Pakistan Stock Exchange KSE-100 shares index shed 1.32 points to close at 43,232.83 points. The KSE-30 shares index gained 0.12 per cent, or 20.28 points, to close at 16,718.24 points.

As many as 330 scrips were active, of which only 115 advanced, 205 declined and 10 remained unchanged.

The ready market volumes stood at 287.7 million shares, compared with the turnover of 386.75 million shares in the last trading session.

An analyst at Arif Habib Limited said the bears ruled over the bulls on Friday due to the concerns over alarming current account deficit, depreciation of the rupee and big jump in the cutoff yields of the treasury bills, indicating hawkish stance in the upcoming monetary policy.

“Thursday, sharp downfall in the market occurred due to sell-off by mutual funds, which eventually created attractive opportunity for the value hunters. The market opened on a positive note, as the value hunters did aggressive buying in the first session. In the second session, across-the-board selling was witnessed, as the dollar closed at an all-time low of Rs176.77.”

Moving forward, analysts expect the market to remain volatile and recommend cautious approach.

The companies that reflected the highest gains included Pakistan Tobacco, up Rs66.63 to close at Rs1,050/share; and Sapphire Fiber, up Rs62.75 to close at Rs908/share.

The companies, which reflected the most losses included Unilever Foods, down Rs900 to close at Rs19,500/share and Rafhan Maize, down Rs266 to close at Rs9,509/share.

Highest volumes were witnessed in WorldCall Telecom with a turnover of 24.35 million shares. The scrip gained four paisas to close at Rs2.05/share; followed by TPL Properties with a turnover of 20.55 million shares. It shed Rs2.43 to close at Rs37.79/share. Byco Petroleum remained the third with a turnover of 16.96 million shares. It shed 16 paisas to finish at Rs5.79.