Massive selling pressure was observed at the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX), with the benchmark KSE-100 Index shedding over 4,100 points during the intraday trading on Thursday.
At 12:20pm, the benchmark index was hovering at 174,741.02, a decrease of 4,112.07 points or 2.3%.
“The market remains under pressure as rising oil prices and escalating US-Iran tensions dampened investor sentiment,” Saad Hanif, Head of Research at Ismail Iqbal Securities, told media.
He added that apart from foreign investors, local investors also turned cautious, contributing to the selling pressure.
Selling was observed in key sectors, including cement, commercial banks, fertilizer, oil and gas exploration companies, OMCs, power generation and refinery. Index-heavy stocks, including ARL, HUBCO, MARI, OGDC, PPL, POL, PSO, SNGPL, MCB, MEBL and NBP, traded in the red.
The Privatisation Commission Board (PC Board) under the chairmanship of Muhammad Ali, Adviser to the Prime Minister on Privatisation and Chairman, Privatisation Commission, constituted a Negotiation Committee to engage with the Asian Development Bank (ADB) to negotiate the terms of a potential Financial Advisory Services Agreement (FASA) in connection with the proposed privatisation of Islamabad International Airport (IIA).
On Wednesday, PSX staged a decisive recovery as aggressive buying propelled benchmark indices sharply higher, reversing a portion of the steep losses suffered in recent sessions. The rebound was supported by strong participation from both institutional and retail investors, as value-hunting emerged following the recent correction.
The benchmark KSE-100 Index closed at 178,853.10 points
Internationally, Asian stocks rose on Thursday, supported by gains in technology giants on Wall Street, while lingering US-Iran tensions kept oil prices supported and left gold underpinned by safe-haven flows.
In currencies, the dollar firmed after minutes from the Federal Reserve’s latest meeting showed policymakers were in no rush to cut rates.
Trading was thinned in Asia with markets in Hong Kong, China and Taiwan closed for the Lunar New Year holiday, but MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan was up 0.5%, and Japan’s Nikkei gained 0.85%, led by technology shares.
South Korea’s Kospi jumped about 3% to a record high.
That followed a rise in shares of tech heavyweights on Wall Street, following news on Tuesday that it signed a multiyear deal to sell Meta Platforms millions of its current and future artificial intelligence chips.
This is an intra-day update
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