Karachi—Life returned to Karachi Stock Exchange and things took a bright look after suffering gloomy atmosphere at least for last six months. The market saw shapes of green after being gripped of bearish sentiments after the removal of the cap from KSE-100 which gained 40.39points to close at 5,793.57points level while turnover surged by 179% from yesterday to 210.8m shares. In the overall market, bulls were finally able to thrash the bears by 166 to 71 from overall 241 scrips traded today. In fact the driving force behind igniting spark in the market was the injection of Rs20 billion State Enterprise Fund as the National Bank of Pakistan, Employees Old age Benefits Institution (EOBI), State Life of Pakistan and a banking consortium transferred Rs5 billion each to the Fund being managed by National Investment Trust. Resultantly, fresh life in the market was quite visible from the beaming faced of the depressed brokers and investors who suffered heavily due to financial turmoil and susp...

The Karachi stock market remained on a negative note on the first day of the New Year Thursday, as investor’s were cautious in the wake of continuation of selling activities by the distressed brokers and institutions, analysts said. The Karachi Stock Exchange (KSE) 100-share index lost 111.83 points to close at 5,753.18 points as compared to 5,865.01 points traded in the previous session. The KSE 30 index shed 143.36 points and closed at 5,341.97 points as against 5,485.97 points of the previous session. The KMI 30 index also declined by 41.88 points to close at 6,661.58 points as compared with 6,703.46 points of the previous session. The market turnover went up by 4.13 percent and traded 75.43 million shares as compared to previous session’s 78.68 million shares. The overall market capitalisation decreased by 1.66 percent to close at Rs 1.827 trillion as compared with Rs 1.858 trillion traded in the previous session. Out of 230 active companies, 106 closed in positive zone, 114 in neg...

The calendar year 2008 eroded the last four years straight and unprecedented growth of local stock markets, as Pakistan’s leading benchmark KSE 100-share Index crashed by over 58 per cent to four years low of Dec 2004 level. The KSE 100 plummeted 58.332 per cent or 8,210.82 points on year-on-year basis to 5,865.01 points on Wednesday from 14,075.83 points on Jan 01. Over the same period, an outflow of Rs2.471 trillion from market capitalisation was also noted. Average daily volumes in the cash market fell 48 per cent in 2008 to 133 million shares. While foreign portfolio investors disinvested US$439 million in net during the year. The year started at local bourses with confidence, cheer, and smooth flight to record high till April despite a lot of hue and cry on political front. Banking, mutual funds, oil marketing companies, refineries, insurance, telecommunication, cement, fertilizer, automobile almost all of the economic sectors were performing on fast pace with every passing day. B...

Pakistan stocks on Wednesday continued to drop as the Karachi Stock Exchange (KSE) benchmark 100-share index hit record low in more than four years. The KSE 100-share index plunged 172.37 points, or 2.85 percent, and closed at 5865.01 points with a trading volume of 78.7 million shares. The KSE index has shed more than 3,500 points from 9,446.81 points after its watchdog removed the trading floor on Dec. 15.

KARACHI: A leave to appeal filed by the stock brokers against a decision by a division bench of Sindh High Court (SHC) was disposed off here on Tuesday by a bench of Supreme Court of Pakistan comprising Justice Moosa K Leghari and Justice Zawwar Hussain Jafferi. When the appeal was taken up, the counsel for appellant stated that the main parties including the appellants and defendants National Clearing Company Pakistan Limited (NCCPL) has arrived at a negotiated settlement and in view of the this appellant is not inclined to press the appeal. The bench allowed the request and disposed off the appeal as not pressed. The controversy pertained to the CFS Mark II system would have resulted in collapse of the Karachi Stock Exchange after default of the main members. staff report

KARACHI - A three-member bench of the Supreme Court of Pakistan on Monday allowed out of the court settlement of the payment of the CFS arrears by the Karachi Stock Exchange brokers to the NCCPL. The SC decided this on the plea of the brokers, who informed the court they wanted an out of court settlement of the CFS issue. The SC adjourned the hearing of the case till December 30.

The process of due diligence for merger of KASB Bank with Atlas Bank will be completed within three weeks, KASB Bank President Muneer Kamal told The News on Monday. “Both banks are still carrying out valuation of each other’s balance sheets before the merger takes place,” he said. “Due diligence takes time and I think we are pretty much on track,” he said, referring to reports that the merger has been held up for some reasons. “It will be completed within 15-20 days.” KASB and Atlas banks earlier announced a merger of their operations in a bid to cope with tight liquidity environment for small banks.The merged entity with an equity of over Rs12 billion and 110 branches will have sound financial standing and wider reach to woo depositors, Atlas Bank President Aziz Rajkotwala said. The merger was supposed to be finalised by this year’s end but the banks are still evaluating the swap ratio in the merged entity, he said. “We are assessing who is going to have how many shares.” State Bank o...