KARACHI: Pakistan equities carried its winning streak on Monday into the new week with Benchmark KSE100 Index settling above 43,500 levels, up 1.8 percent day-on-day (DoD). Bulls continued the run across the board, where activity in all key sectors such as cements, steel and banks was seen. Both, local and foreign investors, showed aggressive as the KSE-100 index made an intraday high of +818 points to close at 43,556 points level, up 770 points. Strong volumes were recorded in Monday’s trading session with more than 377 million shares exchanging hands, while value traded also inched up by 7 percent DoD to $ 119 million. Top volume stock of the day was PIBTL with more than 19 million shares traded. On the news front, the Pakistani rupee strengthened by 4.3 percent to 122.24/123.86 per dollar after media reports that China had agreed to provide $2 billion in loans. Market opened positive as sentiments were boosted after recovery in Pakistani rupee in Inter-bank market post positive developments in open market over the weekend; Rupee improved as much as 3 percent to trade at 124 against the greenback. Market trended upward and sustained gains throughout the day with cements 4.9 percent, steels 4.7 percent, Oil Marketing Companies (OMCs) 2.5 percent and select financials +0.9 percent leading the gains. DG Khan Cement (DGKC) gaining 5 percent closed at its upper circuit after announcing the start of commercials operations of its recently commissioned cement plant in Hub. Cement sector came under limelight where heavyweights closed at their respective upper circuit. On results front, Honda Atlas Car (HCAR) gained 0.84 percent following the announcement of its first quarter result. Murtaza Jafar, an analyst at Elixir Securities said institutional flows to drive momentum in the coming days while ongoing earnings season to keep investors interest intact in the wider market. An equity analyst Maaz Mulla expects the market to depict a similar trend, therefore recommend investors to see any upside in the market as an opportunity to sell. Published in Daily Times, July 31st 2018.