ISLAMABAD: Profit-taking at the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) during the second half of Friday’s trading session wiped out earlier gains and pushed the market into negative.
The stock market opened on a positive note, with the benchmark KSE-100 Index climbing to an intraday high of 146,813.43 points.
However, sentiment shifted in the second half of the trading session as investors began booking profits, pulling the index down to an intraday low of 144,917.18.
By the close of trading, the benchmark index stood at 145,382.79, showing a decline of 264.34 points, or 0.18%.
On Friday, a total of 548,029,081 shares were traded as compared to 712,527,450 shares on the last working day, whereas the price of shares stood at PKR 45.488 billion against PKR 55.677 billion on the previous trading day.
As many as 482 companies transacted their shares in the stock market, 151 of them recorded gains and 296 met losses, whereas the share price of 35 companies remained unchanged.
On Thursday, the PSX extended its record-breaking rally, buoyed by continued bullish sentiment and robust buying by local mutual funds. The KSE-100 Index ended that session at an all-time closing high of 145,647.14 points, up by 558.64 points, or 0.39%.
Global markets trend
On the international front, Japanese equities surged on Friday, supported by positive corporate earnings and expectations that the United States might lift overlapping tariffs on Japanese goods.
In contrast, most other Asian markets declined following a late pullback on Wall Street during the previous session. MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan slipped 0.4%, with Hong Kong leading the declines.
Japanese markets outperformed, with the Nikkei 225 climbing 2% and the Topix index reaching a new record, trading above the 3,000 mark for the first time.
Technology investor SoftBank Group saw its shares rally as much as 11% after reporting a return to profitability in the first quarter. Sony Group also advanced, gaining 6% after rising 4.1% on Thursday on the back of strong earnings.
US stock futures indicated a positive open, with S&P 500 e-minis up 0.3% and Nasdaq futures rising 0.4%, pointing to a potential third consecutive day of gains.
The rally in equities is unfolding “against the backdrop of an emerging titanic dovish pivot at the Federal Reserve,” said Tony Sycamore, market analyst at IG in Sydney.
