Bears were defeated in Wednesday’s trading session despite concerning economic indicators, as the market witnessed recovery and regained 406.56 points. An equity analyst at Next Securities said the stocks rose, regaining some of the sharp losses from the previous sessions, amid news reports of the completion of drilling at Kekra-1 near Karachi’s coast. Market opened positive and touched a high of +559 points as institutional participation was witnessed mainly in the main board stocks. The market remained in green throughout the day and closed at 34,292 level. Positive sentiments in the market can be attributed to attractive valuations of the KSE-100 Index stocks, said an equity analyst, Maaz Mullla. Overall volumes stood at 111 million shares, while value traded stood at $31 million. KEL (+7.7%), MLCF (-2.7%) and BOP (+4.7%) cumulatively contributed more than 25 million shares to the total volume. Buying was largely driven by value hunters with E&P heavyweights PPL (+5%), POL (+5%) and OGDC (+2.4%) leading the charts on back of the news that the offshore drilling near Karachi coast on Indus G-Block (Kekra-1) has finally been completed after four months of hard work. The DST is expected to be completed within next 48 to 72 hours, and if found, a report regarding the total quantity of oil and gas reserves would be prepared within a week. Mixed sentiment were witnessed in the cement sector where FCCL (+3.0%), CHCC (+2.3%) and LUCK (+1.0%) closed in the green while, on the flipside, KOHC (-4.4%), DGKC (-3.6%) and MLCF (-2.7%) closed in the red zone. Mulla expects bearish sentiments in the market to continue on the back of concerning economic indicators. Hence, he recommended investors to remain cautious in trading.