The Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) witnessed strong early trade on Tuesday, with the benchmark KSE-100 Index surging nearly 950 points as investor sentiment remained upbeat amid supportive market cues.
At 10:05am, the benchmark index was hovering at 156,333.45, an increase of 948.95 points or 0.61%.
Buying interest was observed in key sectors including automobile assemblers, commercial banks, cement, fertiliser, oil and gas exploration companies, OMCs, power generation and refinery. Index-heavy stocks, including ARL, HUBCO, MARI, OGDC, PPL, POL, PSO, SNGPL, SSGC, DGKC, HBL, MCB, MEBL and UBL, traded in the green.
As widely anticipated, the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) of the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) has decided to keep the policy rate unchanged at 11%, citing the adverse impact of recent floods on the near-term macroeconomic outlook.
On Monday, the PSX opened the week on a bullish note as the index gained 944.82 points, or 0.61%, to close at 155,384.51.
Internationally, Asian stocks climbed on Tuesday while the dollar was on the back foot as investors bet the US Federal Reserve would resume its easing cycle this week and potentially leave the door open to further rate cuts.
Markets hardly reacted to news that the US Senate narrowly confirmed Stephen Miran to the Fed’s Board of Governors while a US appeals court separately declined to allow President Donald Trump to fire Fed Governor Lisa Cook.
Both moves were seen as unlikely to shift the needle for the Fed’s decision on Wednesday, where a 25-basis-point cut is fully priced in.
Expectations of imminent Fed rate cuts have kept the market mood buoyant over the past few sessions and sent stocks scaling new highs.
MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan rose to a more than four-year top early on Tuesday and last traded 0.3% higher, while Japan’s Nikkei and Topix indexes notched fresh records.
Just as important for markets will be Fed members’ “dot plot” projections for rates and guidance from Fed Chair Jerome Powell on the extent and pace of any further easing.
Futures already have 127 bps worth of cuts priced in by July 2026, so anything less than dovish will disappoint investors.
This is an intra-day update
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