ISLAMABAD: Buying activity resumed at the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) on Friday, following a brief spell of profit-taking the previous day, with the benchmark KSE-100 Index climbing over 250 points in the latter half of the trading session.
Positive momentum was seen throughout much of the session, propelling the index to an intra-day high of 150,465.17.
By the close of the session, the KSE-100 settled at 149,493.05, marking an increase of 257.79 points, or 0.17%.
Buying interest was observed in key sectors including automobile assemblers, commercial banks, fertiliser, oil and gas exploration companies, OMCs, power generation and refinery. Index-heavy stocks traded in green, including ARL, HUBCO, PSO, SNGPL, SSGC, MEBL, NBP, and UBL.
On Friday, a total of 799,868,015 shares were traded as compared to 1,062,993,695 shares on the last working day, whereas the price of shares stood at PKR 40.372 billion against PKR 55.824 billion on the previous trading day.
As many as 478 companies transacted their shares in the stock market, 251 of them recorded gains and 198 met losses, whereas the share price of 29 companies remained unchanged.
The rebound followed Thursday’s sharp sell-off, which saw the market come under significant profit-taking pressure. The KSE-100 had closed at 149,235.26, shedding 1,355.74 points or 0.9%, ending a streak of record highs.
Global market trend
On the global front, Asian markets saw modest gains in a cautious start to Friday’s trade, as investors awaited Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell’s remarks at the annual Jackson Hole symposium for clues on future interest rate policy.
MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan rose 0.2%, extending its gains to 1.6% for the month. South Korea’s Kospi led the region with a 1% rise, while China’s CSI 300 Index marked its third straight day of gains. Japan’s Nikkei 225 fluctuated during the session but was last up 0.1%.
Meanwhile, US stock futures also showed slight gains, with S&P 500 futures up 0.1%. The underlying index is on a five-day losing streak, putting it on course for its steepest weekly drop in August.
Investor expectations for a September rate cut had surged earlier this month following weaker-than-expected US jobs data and subdued inflation readings.
However, sentiment has tempered slightly after the release of minutes from the Fed’s July meeting.
According to the CME FedWatch tool, the probability of a rate cut in September has dipped to 75%, down from 82.4% on Thursday.
