Global Times - Pakistan's KSE sees biggest single-day rise

Pakistan's KSE sees biggest single-day rise

Source: Xinhua
[08:59 August 25 2009]
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Pakistan's Karachi Stock Exchange (KSE) witnessed the biggest single-day rise of this year on Monday thanks to positive financial results of Pakistan Petroleum Limited(PPL) and Pakistan's rating improvement by the Standard & Poor's.

The benchmark KSE 100-Index surged by 179.06 points to close at8287.00, KSE 30-Index increased by 225.45 points to end at 8,818.15, while KSE All Share Index gained 118.07 points to finish the day at 5,897.98.

As it was the first trading session of the Holy fasting month of Ramazan, analysts had expected reduced volume, but positive news lured investors as 145.628 million shares changed hands, 19.641 million shares more than Friday' s volume.

Meanwhile, the market registered 191 gainers, 163 losers and 28flat ones.

In terms of trading volume, Pakistan Telecommunication Company Limited, Pakistan PTA Limited and Oil and Gas Development Company Limited occupied the top three places, with 12.630 million, 12.440million and 12.158 million shares respectively.

Market analysts told Xinhua that investors remained sidelined in early morning trading session and trading became active as positive news started to roll out.

Standard & Poor decided to raise Pakistan's long-term sovereign rating to B-minus from CCC+ citing improvements in its external liquidity and fiscal deficit reduction. The rating outlook is now stable.

PPL reported a 40 percent increase in its profit to reach 27.7 billion rupees (one U.S. dollar is about equal to 82 rupees) for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2009.