KARACHI: The Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) registered nominal gains on Wednesday following another volatile session, with the benchmark KSE-100 index gaining 156 points to close above 45,000 level.
The index opened higher and touched the day’s high of 45,495 points before facing a mid-session fall which brought the index to 44,782 points before it managed to close at 45,063.
All share volumes increased by 114 million shares from Tuesday to around 340 million shares today. The traded value also climbed to Rs18.2 billion from Rs13.3 billion a day earlier. Of the total of 374 traded scrips, 215 advanced and 139 declined while 2 remained unchanged.
The cement sector dominated trading for the third session in a row with 58.6 million shares traded while technology and communication followed with 46.4m shares traded.
Earlier, the PSX opened bullish after adding 583 points to reach 45490 points level in early trading. The Pakistan Stock Exchange lost most of the early gains and added 58 points to reach 44965 points level till midday.
Yesterday, the stocks closed marginally up at 44,907 points after gaining 9.51 points. KSE 100-index has now surged by 18.4 percent from December 19, 2017 to date.
Top 5 index point contributors were OGDC (up 1.4%), DAWH (3.2%), POL (1.8%), LUCK (0.7%) & NESTLE (4.9%), adding 116 points to the index gain while HBL (down 1.9%), ENGRO (1.7%), UBL (0.8%), HCAR (5%) & SNGP (1.8%) withheld 116 points from the index.
Overall, volumes stood at 226m shares as compared to 294m shares traded previously. SSGC (up 1.72%) from the gas utility led the volume chart with more than 13m shares exchanging hands.
