KARACHI: The Pakistan Stock Exchange’s (PSX) benchmark KSE-100 Index bounced back on Tuesday and witnessed a bullish rally on renewed buying across the board after the government announced the much-awaited economic measures through revised Finance Bill 2018.
The index gained 717.60 points to settle at 41,238. It was hovering at 41,159.77 points with clipped gains of 639.3 points, or 1.58%, at 2:53pm.
The government has withdrawn the conditions demanding car and property buyers to be a tax filer. The announcement invited euphoric buying in the concerned sectors, including cement and steel sectors.
Food, chemical, cement, IT and telecom and textile stocks led the rally from the front, as they appeared the most traded stocks at PSX.
According to experts the modification in the budget is better than the expectations, on the back of which market rallied and closed the day into green territory. Participants opted to remain active in cement, energy, and banking.
Buying was largely driven by value hunters with cement and steel heavyweights Lucky Cement (+5%), DG Khan Cement (+5%), Maple Leaf Cement (+5%), Pioneer Cement (+5%), International Steels (+5%) and Amreli Steels (+2.29%) leading the chart, cumulatively contributing 128 points to the index.
Pakistan Petroleum (+1.80%) from the exploration and production sector declared its FY18 result, where the company posted earnings per share of Rs23.24 and cash payout of Rs1.50 per share along with 15% bonus shares.
Overall, trading volumes increased to 166.5 million shares compared with Monday’s tally of 145.2 million. The value of shares traded during the day was Rs7.5 billion.
Shares of 382 companies were traded. At the end of the day, 287 stocks closed higher, 68 declined and 27 remained unchanged.
Lotte Chemical was the volume leader with 13.2 million shares, gaining Rs0.49 to close at Rs14.7. It was followed by Unity Foods with 10.4 million shares, gaining Rs1.72 to close at Rs36.24 and Maple Leaf Cement Factory with 9.5 million shares, gaining Rs2.33 to close at Rs49.09.
