KARACHI: Bears dominated the trading on the stock market on Thursday in response to the latest auction of market treasury bills in which cut-off yields remai­ned flat across all tenors.

According to Arif Habib Ltd, the oil and gas marketing segment remained under pressure as the regulator reduced the petrol price 3.4 per cent to Rs140.82 per litre — a move that led to inventory losses to oil and gas marketing companies. Similarly, the pharmaceutical sector stayed in the red zone as the government considered imposing sales tax on the import of active ingredients and the local supply of medicines.

As a result, the KSE-100 index lost 635.66 points or 1.43pc to close at 43,731.20 points.

Market participation decreased 21.6pc to 312.1 million shares while the value of traded shares also went down 13.1pc to $56.9m.

Sectors taking away the highest number of points from the benchmark index included commercial banking (198.71 points), cement (115.66 points), fertiliser (65.2 points), oil and gas exploration (64.1 points) and oil and gas marketing (44.05 points).

Stocks that contributed significantly to the traded volume included WorldCall Telecom Ltd (49.18m shares), TeleCard Ltd (30.92m shares), Byco Petroleum Ltd (18.96m shares), TRG Pakistan Ltd (16.99m shares) and Unity Foods Ltd (13.91m shares).

Shares contributing positively to the index were TRG Pakistan Ltd (46.21 points), Unity Foods Ltd (16.6 points), Mari Petroleum Ltd (11.14 points), Allied Bank Ltd (6.73 points) and Kohinoor Textile Mills Ltd (4.3 points).

Stocks that took away the maximum number of points from the index included Habib Bank Ltd (58.56 points), Lucky Cement Ltd (58.3 points), MCB Bank Ltd (49.27 points), Systems Ltd (37.57 points) and Pakistan Petroleum Ltd (35 points).

Stocks recording the biggest declines in percentage terms included Bannu Woollen Mills Ltd, which went down 6.33pc, followed by K-Electric Ltd (5.6pc), Aisha Steel Mills Ltd (5.54pc), Adamjee Insurance Company Ltd (4.78pc) and Murree Brewery Company Ltd (4.74pc).

Foreign investors remained net sellers as they offloaded shares worth $1.97m on a net basis.

Published in Dawn, December 17th, 2021