Pakistan equities closed Tuesday positive with benchmark KSE-100 Index gaining 208 points, closing at 37,130 levels, up 0.6 percent.
The local bourse made a high and a low of +349 and -329 points, respectively.
An equity analyst at IIS Securities said the positive sentiment was mainly driven by improved trade numbers for the month of March 2019. As per news reports, trade deficit is down to Rs 1.9 billion for March 2019 from Rs 2.7 billion for February 2019. Power generation and OMCs also continue to garner investors’ attention upon news flow related to government’s plan to list another Islamic bond worth Rs 200 billion in the capital market in May 2019.
Market remained under pressure during the initial trading hours but later recovered, said Danish Ladhani, an equity analyst. “Pressure came in due to cements as rumors continued to float that the cement cartels have wedged apart on the matters of pricing quotes where Chitral Cement Company Limited (CHCC) losing 5 percent, Maple Leaf Cement (MLCF) losing 4.7 percent, and Pioneer Cement Company (PIOC) losing 4.6 percent closed limit down”.
In terms of index points, power generation companies followed by commercial banks contributed the most to index gains Tuesday.
Major laggards were Lucky Cement (-2.3%) and DG Khan Cement (DGKC) (-0.5%). Mixed sentiment seen in the Financials today where Habib Bank Limited (HBL) (-0.8%) closed in the red but National Bank of Pakistan (NBP) (+4.5%) and United Bank Limited (UBL) (-2.7%) closed in the negative zone.
Mixed views seen in the Fertilizers where Engro (+0.9%), Engro Fertiliser (EFERT) (+0.8%) and Fauji Fertiliser Bin Qasim (FFBL) (+3.5%) closed in the green.
Furthermore, Oil Gas Development Company (OGDC) (+0.5%) and Pakistan Oil Fields (POL) (+0.6%) closed higher as the international oil price hits five-month high above $71 per barrel.
Hubco (+4.2%), UBL (+2.7%), PSO (+3.0%), NBP (+4.5%), ENGRO (+0.9%) and OGDC (+0.5%) were top stocks that cumulatively contributed +166 points to the positive closing. Average daily traded value stood at $42 million, up 45 percent and volume stood at 160 million shares, up 50 percent.
Furthermore, major contribution to total market volume came from UNITYR1 (-22%), MLCF (-4.7%), FCCL (-3.7%) and KEL (+5.6%).
Ladhani expects market to remain choppy and volatile. He recommends investors to stay cautious in the short run ahead of MSCI rebalancing and IMF meeting ahead this week.