Stocks falter as political temperature rises

Share pri­ces settled on the lower side after hovering within a short range throughout the trading session on Wednesday. Arif Habib Ltd said the benchmark of representative shares traded in the green initially but moved both ways later on because of political noise as well as recent developments on the front of the International Monetary Fund programme. Stocks dipped in the final trading hour as investors chose to book profits. Volumes remained strong across the board, with third-tier equities dominating the volume board. A downtrend in the currency market also contributed to the negative sentiments on the national bourse. As a result, the KSE-100 index settled at 41,833.66 points, down 172.59 points or 0.41 per cent from the preceding session. The overall trading volume decreased 36pc to 125.5 million shares. The traded value went down 69.8pc to $12.4m on a day-on-day basis. Stocks contributing significantly to the traded volume included World­Call Telecom Ltd (18.4m shares), Fauji Foods Ltd (8.4m shares), Hum Network Ltd (6m shares), Balochistan Glass Ltd (3.9m shares) and Lotte Chemical Pakistan Ltd (3.5m shares). Sectors contributing the most to the index performance were exploration and production (-90.1 points), commercial banking (-35.1 points), investment banking (-34.1 points), technology and communication (-33.7 points) and cement (-27.6 points).