KARACHI: Bearish sentiments prevailed at the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) on Thursday, with the indices succumbing to selling pressure following the announcement of financial results by prominent market players.
Global equity markets also showed a negative trend, while Crude oil prices declined from the previous close; WTI crude price falling 1.02pc to $42.67 and Brent crude price dropping 1.06pc to $44.89.
“Despite a positive start to proceedings, the stock market lost over 350 points intraday mainly due to selling activity observed in fertiliser, banking, cement, refinery and oil & gas marketing companies, especially after the announcement of financial results by banking players,” said a report issued by AHL Ltd. “Following their respective financial announcements, FABL had hit lower circuit while MCB also lost ground but remained above the lower circuit.”
The benchmark KSE-100 Index remained in the red zone for almost the entire session, recording its intraday low at 39,781.39 after losing 372.72 points. It settled lower by 285.56 points at 39,868.55.
Among other indices, the KMI-30 Index lost 696.66 points to close at 64,401.88, while the KSE All Share Index dropped 146.82 points, ending at 28,075.02.
The overall market volumes contracted further from 427.19 million shares in the previous session to 394.62 million shares (-8pc). Average traded value also declined by 24pc, from $110.4 million to $84.4 million. TRG Pakistan Ltd (TRG +2.67pc), Pakistan Telecommunication Company Ltd (PTC +2.94pc) and Unity Foods Ltd (UNITY +2.57pc) led the volume chart, exchanging 30.42 million, 21.05 million and 20.14 million shares, respectively.
Sectors that drove the benchmark index south included cement (-79.90 points), banking (-44.12 points) and oil & gas exploration (-26.69 pts). Among the companies, MCB Bank Ltd (MCB -69.86 points), Hub Power Company Ltd (HUBC 31.54 points) and Lucky Cement Ltd (LUCK 29.42 points) dented the index the most.
Shedding 1.91pc from its cumulative market capitalization, the cement emerged as the session top loser, with DG Khan Cement Company (DGKC 2.42pc), Maple Leaf Cement Factory (MLCF 2.34pc) and Lucky Cement (LUCK 1.65pc) closing in the negative territory.
On the financial side, MCB Bank Ltd (MCB -4.22pc) declared earnings per share of Rs5.65 for the second quarter of FY20 (Rs4.72 in 2QFY19), Mari Petroleum Company Ltd (MARI -0.96pc) announced an EPS of Rs227.23 for FY20 (Rs182.36 in FY19), while Pakistan Refinery Ltd (PRL -3.04pc) published an EPS of Rs-17.74 for FY20 (Rs-13.68 last year).
Meanwhile, TPL Properties Ltd (TPLP +12.50pc) and Bank AL Habib Ltd (BAHL +0.66pc) announced that they have entered into a sale-purchase agreement for the company’s flagship project “Centrepoint”.
