KARACHI: Following an overnight celebration of reaching a Staff-Level Agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) experienced sluggish conditions on Thursday due to declining economic growth and foreign exchange reserves ahead of long closure.

Nevertheless, the benchmark KSE 100 index added modest gains to the previous day’s rally. Sentiments turned cautious after the IMF announced that it had allowed a Re1 reduction in the power tariff rather than the Rs8 per unit cut discussed within government circles, undermining investor confidence.

Ahsan Mehanti of Arif Habib Corporation said the market closed flat amid a surge in the government treasury bond yields up to 12.38pc and subdued economic growth data at 1.7pc approved by the National Accounts Committee for the October-December quarter, falling short 3.6pc of projected growth for 2024-25.

Topline Securities Ltd said lacklustre activity was observed on the last trading session before the long Eidul Fitr break, as the index traded between its intraday high of 375 points at 118,147 and low of 221 points at 117,551 to close at 117,806.75, up 34.43 points or 0.03pc finally.

Significant positive contributions to the index came from United Bank, Hub Power, MCB Bank, Meezan Bank, and Lucky Cement, which cumulatively contributed 55 points. Conversely, Systems Ltd, Fauji Fertiliser, Pakistan Petroleum, Mari Energies, and National Bank took away 29 points.

Ali Najib, Head of Sales at Insight Securities, said the PSX underwent a consolidation phase as investors chose to trim their positions ahead of a long break.

The market participation remained low as the trading volume fell 7.49pc to 329.99 million shares while the traded value plunged 42.26pc to Rs19.77bn day-on-day.

Stocks contributing significantly to the traded volume included Cnergy­ico PK (45.50m shares), Arif Habib Corporation (20.57m shares), Worldcall Telecom (16.22m shares), Fauji Cement (14.24m shares) and The Bank of Punjab (12.40m shares).

The shares registering the most significant increases in their share prices in absolute terms were Philip Morris (Rs73.78), Hoechst Pakistan (Rs48.63), Pakistan Tobacco (Rs39.00), Highnoon Laboratories (Rs32.37) and Ghandhara Auto (Rs16.15).

The companies registering significant decreases in their share prices in absolute terms were Sapphire Fibres (Rs20.39), Premium Textile (Rs18.88), Rafhan Maize (Rs17.94), Sapphire Textile (Rs15.33) and Systems Ltd (Rs14.44).

Published in Dawn, March 28th, 2025