Stocks drift lower ahead of FATF announcement

The benchmark index of the Pakistan Stock Exchange moved in both directions on Thursday ahead of the expected announcement from the Financial Action Task Force, which is likely to reclassify Pakistan into its white list from the grey list. Topline Securities said the KSE-100 index opened in the green zone and made an intraday high of 196 points (0.46 per cent). But profit-taking kicked in afterwards and pushed the index to the intraday low of 129 points (-0.31pc). According to Arif Habib Ltd, the rupee’s weakness against the dollar eroded investors’ confidence and caused profit-taking, which triggered the benchmark to close on the lower side. The rupee depreciated 0.03pc to 220.95 against the greenback in the interbank market. As a result, the KSE-100 index settled at 42,137.04 points, down 89.01 points or 0.21pc from the preceding session.