A fire incident halted trading for more than two hours, but the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) maintained its bullish run as the benchmark KSE-100 index settled at a new record high on Monday.
The index remained flattish during the first hour of trading, before the market saw suspension from 10:25am till 12:30pm, after fire broke out at the main building where several brokerage houses have their offices.
However, momentum returned to the bourse after trading resumed as the KSE-100 index hit an intra-day’s high of 80,737.71, with an addition of 524.92 points.
At close, the benchmark index settled at a new record high level of 80,566.21, an increase of 353.41 points or 0.44%.
Buying was witnessed in key sectors including automobile assembler, cement, commercial banks, oil and gas exploration companies and OMCs.
Index-heavy stocks including OGDC, PPL, PSO, SHEL, HBL and NBP settled in the green.
During the previous week, PSX witnessed a bullish trend and hit the then highest ever level on the back of aggressive buying by both local and foreign investors coupled with institutional support.
The benchmark KSE-100 index surged by 1,767.83 points on week-on-week basis and crossed the 80,000 psychological level to close at 80,212.79 points.
Globally, Asian stocks inched higher on Monday as investors grew more confident about a September US rate cut, while the euro grappled with political uncertainty as French elections pointed to a hung parliament.
In France, a leftist alliance unexpectedly took top spot ahead of the far right, a major upset that was set to prevent Marine Le Pen’s National Rally (RN) from running the government.
The loss of the far right was something of a relief for investors, though they also have concerns the left’s plans could unwind many of President Emmanuel Macron’s pro-market reforms.
MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan were up 0.1%, after reaching a two-year top last week.
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