PSX benchmark KSE-100 index gained 372 points on week-on-week basis and finally closed at 44,551 points at the end of last week compared to 44,179 points a week earlier.
The market after touching 45,000 (KSE-100 index) level during the week, posted muted gains closing up by 0.8 percent WoW. Investors adopted a cautious stance on the back of slowdown in foreign buying, rise in US-Pak tensions and Fitch rating agency changing Pakistan's outlook to negative.
The volatility helped increase overall activity at the bourse as average daily turnover increased to 275.39 million shares, up 50 percent WoW as compared to previous week's average of 184.13 million shares. Average daily trading value mounted up by 45 percent to Rs 12.77 billion.
The foreign investors remained net buyers of shares worth $11.7 million during the week, taking net buying to $90 million in 2018. Total market capitalization increased by 1.4 percent or Rs 124 billion to Rs 9.217 trillion up from Rs 9.093 trillion.
KSE top traded companies were TRG Pak with 73.926 million shares, K-Electric 73.264 million, Dewan Cement 63.62 million, Punjab, B O Punjab 59.648 million and Power Cement 51.412 million shares trading during the last week ending January 26, 2017.
Analysts at JS Global Capital said that the PSX started the week off where it left last week (+2.9 percent WoW) with benchmark KSE-100 index closing 719 points higher on Monday. Much of this enthusiasm carried forward during the next two days; however, profit taking was witnessed on Thursday, when the market went down by 246 points and Friday some 265 points ahead of the Monetary Policy announcement. The last two days decline wiped out most of the gains recorded earlier in the week. Hence, the KSE-100 closed the week just 372 points higher (+0.8 percent WoW).
The selling during the end of the week also coincided with Fitch revising down its outlook on Pakistan to 'Negative' from 'Stable', though it affirmed its 'B' rating on Pakistan, they added.
The week also witnessed a mixed bag of macro releases, where the (1) C/A deficit clocked in at $1.13 billion for Dec-2017 compared to $1.44 billion for Nov-2017, (2) Large-scale Manufacturing registered a decline of 2.02 percent YoY in Nov-2017 and (3) Foreign exchange reserves slipped further by $131 million to $19.64 billion.