Index crosses psychological barrier, gains 234 points (24072008)

LEADER REPORT
KARACHI: The market maintained its bullish trend and soon sprinted upwards to gain around 300 points on Wednesday. The market remained in the positive zone throughout the session while some short dips were seen. At the end, some profit-taking was witnessed in blue chip scrips, as the index closed with a gain of 234 points at 11,019 points. The volumes seem to be improving day by day, as they totaled to 180 million shares.
The four days of positive movement was seen after economic managers started addressing issues of the stock market and provided investors the confidence to extend support to the market. The positive sentiment prevailing in the market got boosted after the visit of the Finance Minister and SBP Governor to KSE.
The flight of foreign capital continued after a day's break, as a minor inflow was witnessed on Monday. The net outflow in foreign investors portfolio investment on Tuesday was USD 6 million, while a massive gain of 410 points was witnessed. This shows that the foreign investors are not participating in the market and local institutions are active in the market. The government needs to set up policies to regain investors' confidence, specially the foreign investors. The rupee showed stability again.
The attractively valued banking sector remained under the investors top picks, as all the actives traded in the upper band with high volumes. Cement sector, the victim of the bearish spell seen in the past, performed well. E&P sector also acted well, while at the end profit-taking was witnessed in OGDC, and it closed in the negative zone.
Other than the political, economic and law and order situation, the major threat to the capital market is the monetary policy. While the market has discounted the impact of further increase in discount rate to an extent.