Buying interest returned to the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX), with the benchmark KSE-100 Index gaining nearly 2,000 points during the opening minutes of trading on Thursday.
At 9:30am, the benchmark index was hovering at 157,764.37, an increase of 1,987.16 points or 1.28%.
Buying was observed in key sectors, including automobile assemblers, cement, commercial banks, oil and gas exploration companies, OMCs, power generation and refinery. Index-heavy stocks, including ARL, HUBCO, MARI, OGDC, PPL, POL, PSO, SNGPL, SSGC, MCB, MEBL, NBP and UBL, traded in the green.
On Wednesday, PSX witnessed another volatile session with the benchmark KSE-100 Index settling in the red as cautious investor sentiment, geopolitical uncertainty and broad intraday swings kept participants on the defensive.
The KSE-100 Index declined by 1,354.88 points or 0.86% to close at 155,777.21 points.
Globally, Asian shares rallied on Thursday with a decline in US Treasuries, pointing to a tentative recovery in risk appetite that has been hammered by the escalating war in the Middle East.
South Korea’s KOSPI gauge recovered its steep losses in the prior session following a rally on Wall Street on hopes the United States and Iran will seek an off-ramp from hostilities. Oil and gold traded higher.
China set its growth target at a slightly lower pace than the previous year in a closely watched, wide-ranging economic plan.
The US Senate backed President Donald Trump’s military campaign against Iran, suggesting no quick resolution to a war that has roiled financial markets, transportation networks, and energy production.
MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan jumped 2.9%. South Korea’s KOSPI led regional benchmarks with a 10.4% surge, while Japan’s Nikkei jumped 2.9%.
The yield on benchmark US 10-year notes rose 2.7 basis points to 4.109%, as the 30-year bond yield rose 3.1 basis points to 4.7479%.
The U.S.-Israel war on Iran widened sharply on Wednesday after a U.S. submarine sank an Iranian warship and NATO air defences destroyed an Iranian ballistic missile fired towards Turkey.
But equity markets in Europe and the U.S. took solace from a pledge by Trump to protect shippers and a New York Times report that Iranian intelligence had reached out to the CIA early in the war about a path towards ending it.
This is an intra-day update
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