KARACHI: The Pakistan Stock Exchange Friday gained another 245 points to reach 43152.42 points level till midday.
Earlier, the stocks opened bullish and added 150.32 points to reach 43057.68 points level in early trading.
On Thursday, the PSX 100-share index posted a gain of 285 points and closed at 42,907 points. Positive sentiment prevailed in oil and gas exploration companies on the back of rising crude prices. Oil and Gas development company (OGDC), Pakistan Oil Fields (POL) and Pakistan Petroleum (PPL) registered a gain in the range of 4.0%-4.8%. Banking sector lost most of its intra-day gain, as CPI number for the month of Nov-2016 clocked in at 3.8% YoY versus 4.2% YoY for the month of Oct-2016. HBL (down 1.47%) and MCB (1.09%) were major losers of the aforementioned sector. Overall, volumes increased to 504m shares, while value increased to Rs18.1b/$172m.