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Bearish trend continues on LSE

Recorder Report

Lahore: Share values suffered across-the-board decline as the downward thrust continued on the Lahore Stock Exchange (LSE) here on Wednesday.

The LSE 101-share index registered a fall of 12.68 points and closed at 451.13 points as against its overnight closing of 463.81 points.

The trade volume, however, improved by 14.552 million shares. It was registered at 67.945 million shares against 53.393 million shares a day earlier.

The market opened on a depressed note and continued to trade in a bearish mode throughout the trading sessions. Though the fall was observed across the board, blue chips, including Adamjee Insurance; PSO; PTCL and Fauji Fertilizer, were the hardest hit.

Market analysts stated that the ongoing technical correction was the main cause of the share values decline, while some said that the news of the increase in defence budget by India had also cast a negative shadow on the market sentiments.

A market analyst, Dr. Shahid Zia of Zafar Securities, said the bearish spell has been continuing for the last week, while the news of Indian announcement of raising its defence budget appeared on Wednesday morning, therefore, it was not the only reason of the market's downward thrust. He said the continuous decline in equity values showed that the market was in a highly overbought position.

He said at the moment there was no panic selling in the market, and if that happens, it would lead to a crash-like situation.

However, the investors were not much worried about the present state of affairs of the market.

Out of total of 168 scrips, only 13 could improve their worth, 65 landed in the negative columns, while 90 stayed pegged at their previous levels.

Among the major gainers, Millat Tractors was up by Rs 10.00, Soneri Bank Rs 3.75, Brothers Textile Mills Rs 3.00, Zahoor Textile Mills Rs 1.20 and Genertech Pakistan 90 paisa.

Key losers were led by Umer Fabrics. It plunged by Rs 30.00, while Adamjee Insurance went down by Rs 12.00, PSO Rs 4.50, Sui Northern Rs 1.40, PTCL Rs 1.35 and Crescent Investment Bank Rs 1.10.