Stocks retreat on political uncertainty

Share prices rose initially on Monday, but pessimism soon overpowered the bulls and drove down the representative index of the Pakistan Stock Exchange. Arif Habib Ltd said a lack of investors’ involvement pushed the index into the red territory soon after the opening bell rang. Trading remained subdued for the rest of the session with prices swinging in both directions before closing on the lower side. Investors chose to stay on the sidelines owing to the expectation about a policy rate hike in the Monetary Policy Committee’s meeting scheduled for Tuesday. Volumes on the mainboard dried up with third-tier companies dominating shares trading. As a result, the KSE-100 index settled at 39,889.90 points, down 110.93 points or 0.28 per cent from the preceding session. The overall trading volume decreased 33.7pc to 74.4 million shares. The traded value went down 55.5pc to $6.2m on a day-on-day basis. Stocks contributing significantly to the traded volume included Telecard Ltd (17.8m shares), WorldCall Telecom Ltd (3.7m shares), Pak Elektron Ltd (3.5m shares), the Bank of Punjab Ltd (3.5m shares) and Pakistan International Bulk Terminal Ltd (3.4m shares).