KARACHI: The Pakistan Stock Exchange Friday remained bearish all the day over so-called political turmoil in the country as the benchmark 100-inded 345.53 points to drop to 45288.49 points level.
The stocks recorded the highest trading level of 45634.02 points and lowest level of 45261.25 points, with the volume of about 144.64 million shares and value of Rs8.87 billion. As many as 351 companies were active; of which 134 advanced, 199 declined and 18 remained unchanged.
Azgard Nine was the volume leader with 18.57 million shares, adding Rs0.82 to reach Rs16.59. It was followed by TRG Pak Ltd with 6.23 million shares, gaining Rs0.83 to end at Rs44.66 and Aisha Steel Mill with 5.36 million shares, increasing Rs0.29 to close at Rs22.73.
The top three gainers were ICI Pakistan with price per share of 1039.50 (24.08), Mari Petroleum with price per share of 1809.41 (19.40) and Siemens Pak of 819.99 (19.18).
The top three losers were Wyeth Pak Ltd with price per share of 2232 (-67.30), Murree Brewery with price per share of 875 (-35.05) and Indus Dyeing share of 600 (-25).
Earlier, the PSX observed volatility in early trading and lost 176 points to reach 45458 points level. The stocks remained bearish till midday as the benchmark 100-index lost another 200 points to drop to 45434 points level.
On Thursday, the stocks witnessed another bearish session due to prevailing political uncertainty due to which the benchmark shares index lost 365 points.
In the initial hours of the day KSE-100 index gained to make an intraday high of 214 points. However, on account of political noise and foreign selling the index plummeted to close 365 points below previous day’s closing, at 45,634 level. PAEL (down 3.9pc) declared its 1HY17 result today in which the company posted an EPS of Rs5.44/share and DPS of Rs1.50/share. Steel sector witnessed profit booking as ASL (dip 2.6pc), ISL (slip 4.7pc), and ASTL (slump 2.5pc) closed in the red zone. LUCK (up 1.3pc), MEBL (rose 1.9pc), KTML (up 1pc) and MUREB (up 3.8pc) contributed 49 points to index gain, whereas DAWH (down 1.8pc), PPL (dip 0.7pc) and PSO (down 1.5pc) eroded 47 points from the index.
ANL from the textile composite sector led the market in terms of volumes with 11 million shares changing hands. Traded volumes were down 18 percent to 175 million shares whereas traded value was down 32 percent to Rs9.3 billion/$88.7 million.