March Review

The month of March saw the market move mostly sideways ending 379pts lower at 48155, down 0.8pc. The massive runup in values for three consecutive months since Nov'17 abated in February, with earnings announcements failing to ignite further rally, particularly as the Panama case drags on pending a verdict by the Supreme Court. Sentiment was not helped by outflow of USD22.8mln during march after an out outflow of USD29.6mln during February. Bulk of the outflow was in cements and to a lesser extent in Banks. E&P's saw a net inflow during the month.Turnover continued its southward journey falling to 246mln shares as did value traded  which came down to Rs11.9bln. Compared to February this reflected a decline of 30pc each. 

Top items by value traded in March were SNGP, HBL, TRG, ATRL and PRL. Despite the overall lackluster market PRL, SNGP, CSAP, POWER, MTL returned stellar growth of 87pc, 20pc, 18pc, 17pc and 17pc.

TRG, SSGC, KEL, PSMC, AKZO, POL, PPL, INIL were among companies that suffered the most decline.

Going forward the market is likely to remain volatile seeking support from the next round of quarterly announcements and MSCI related inflows.