Daily Times

The Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) plunged by 3,882 points on Monday amid global market turmoil following China’s retaliatory tariffs against the United States.

The benchmark KSE-100 index plunged by 3,882.18 points, or 3.27 per cent, to stand at 114,909.48 from the previous close of 118,791.66. Trading was earlier halted at the PSX for an hour after the benchmark index plummeted by 6,000 points triggering the suspension, only to drop another 2,000 points when trading resumed.

The automatic circuit breakers are designed to prevent panic selling and provide investors time to reassess during extreme market volatility.

The benchmark KSE-100 index initially declined by 6,287.22 points, or 5.29 per cent by 11:58am, before trading was halted. Shortly after reopening, it declined by a cumulative 8,687.69, or 7.31pc, from the last close to stand at 110,103.97 at 1:15pm.

At 2:02pm, the index stood at 113,154.63, down by 5,637.03 or 4.75pc, from the last close.

Awais Ashraf, director research at AKD Securities, attributed the decline to “investors’ fears that tariff hikes could lead to global recession through weaker demand”.

“We believe being an import-led economy … the imposition of US tariffs would benefit us due to possible decline in global commodity prices,” he added.

Mohammed Sohail, chief executive of Topline Securities, also attributed the decline to the global market crash.

He noted that the stock market had halted after falling 5pc to cool down around 12pm.

Sohail added that the market lost today due to the escalating tariff war initiated by the US.

“After hitting a halt when it fell 5pc, [the] trading resumed after [a] cooling period and saw some value buying,” he said.

He said that the oil and gas exploration sector, technology, and textile sector were expected to be affected as they were either linked to global commodity prices or global aggregate demand.

A notice by the PSX read that a market halt had been triggered due to a 5pc decrease in KSE-30 index from the previous trading day, adding that all outstanding orders had been cancelled automatically by the system.

It noted that the market will resume at 1:03pm after being suspended at 11:58am.

The previous time that the PSX had seen such a massive slump was on December 19, 2024 when the KSE-100 index shed 4,795.31 points amid rising political noise and missile programme-related US sanctions on Pakistani companies.

Trading floors were overcome by a wave of selling as investors fled to the hills on the worst day for equities since the pandemic, with Hong Kong shedding 10pc, Tokyo briefly diving 8pc and Taipei more than 9pc.

Futures for Wall Street’s markets were also taking another drubbing, while concerns about the impact on demand also saw commodities slump.

Donald Trump sparked a market meltdown last week when he unveiled sweeping tariffs against US trading partners for what he says was years of being ripped off and claimed that governments were lining up to cut deals with Washington.

But after Asian markets closed on Friday, China said it would impose retaliatory levies of 34pc on all US goods from April 10. It also imposed export controls on seven rare earth elements, including gadolinium – commonly used in MRIs – and yttrium, utilised in consumer electronics.

Hopes that the US president would rethink his policy in light of the turmoil were dashed Sunday when he said he would not make a deal with other countries unless trade deficits were solved. He denied that he was intentionally engineering a selloff and insisted he could not foresee market reactions.

“Sometimes you have to take medicine to fix something,” he said of the ructions that have wiped trillions of dollars off company valuations.