The Pakistan Stock Exchange's (PSX) benchmark KSE-100 Index remained in the negative territory, amid a lack of positive triggers, as the index lost 328 points, while volumes declined from the previous session on Thursday.

The benchmark KSE 100 index recorded an intraday high of 43,996.62 registering a high of 149.75 points during initial hours. However, it then fell to day’s low of 43,273.76 losing 573.11 pts.

At close on Thursday, the index settled lower by 328.03 points or 0.75% at 43,518.84.

“The devaluation of rupee further dented investors’ confidence,” said Capital Stake in its post-market comment. PKR dropped to a new low of 177.61 against the USD at the close in the inter-bank on Thursday.

Against USD: Pakistan's rupee hits new low

Meanwhile, the central bank is all set to announce its upcoming Monetary Policy Statement (MPS) on 14th December, which will be the first MPS after Pakistan reached a staff-level agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for the sixth review on Nov 22, 2021.

“We expect SBP to increase the policy rate by 100-150bps in upcoming monetary policy,” said Topline Securities in its latest report. “We also expect SBP to revise upwards its inflation and current account estimates.”

KSE-100 manages to sustain 46,000-point level

On the economic front, the number of accounts under Roshan Digital Accounts (RDAs) continued to grow as they were up 10% Month-on-Month in November 2021 to 299,678 accounts whereas funds received under RDA surged to $1.9 billion.

Sectors driving the benchmark index lower included cement (126.90 points), banking (113.38 points), and pharmaceutical (26.58 points).

Volume decreased clocking in at 200.5 million on the all-shares index, down from 233.2 million a day ago. However, the value of shares traded improved to Rs8.75 billion on Thursday.

TRG Pakistan Limited was the volume leader with 25.73 million shares, followed by Telecard Limited with 13.28 million shares, and Hascol Petroleum at 12.54 million shares.

Shares of 332 companies were traded on Thursday, of which 72 registered an increase, 237 recorded a fall, and 23 remained unchanged.

This story was first published in Business Recorder on Dec 9, 2021.