Stocks back to Winning ways as Pak-Iran Tensions Ease
karobarapp 
The Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) saw somewhat of a buying spree early on Friday as tensions between Iran and Pakistan simmered down, with the benchmark KSE-100 up over 700 points during the opening hours of the trading session on Friday.
However, by 10:55 am, the benchmark index had retreated slightly to 63,628.32, an increase of 425.92 points or 0.67%. It earlier hit an intra-day high of 63,911.85.
Across-the-board buying was witnessed with index-heavy sectors including automobile assemblers, commercial banks, cement, chemical, oil and gas exploration companies, OMCs and refinery trading in the green.
Experts attributed the buying spree to easing cross-border tensions between Iran and Pakistan.
“Moreover, prospects of settlement of circular debt” also added to the positive sentiment, said Samiullah Tariq, Head of Research at Pak Kuwait Investment Company Limited.
As per reports, the caretaker minister has prepared an innovative plan to reduce the circular debt of the energy sector, which has been shared with caretaker Finance Minister Dr Shamshad Akhtar.
According to the main features, the plan will be restricted to public sector companies only, budget neutral and zero leakage. “Total settlement of Rs 1.268 trillion will be done.”
On Thursday, escalating regional tension took its toll on investor sentiment at the bourse as the benchmark KSE-100 index sustained further losses to settle at 63,202.40, a decrease of 364.93 points or 0.57%.
Pakistan said on Thursday that it undertook a series of highly coordinated and specifically targeted precision military strikes against what it called terrorist hideouts in the Siestan-o-Baluchistan province of Iran, a little over a day after the neighbour also conducted missile strikes on Pakistani territory.
“Several terrorists were killed during the Intelligence-based operation – codenamed ‘Marg Bar Sarmachar’,” Pakistan’s Foreign Office said in a press release issued on Thursday.
Globally, the Asian shares bounced on Friday, buoyed by a rally in regional chipmakers, while the yen was set to end the week with heavy losses as investors pared back bets the Bank of Japan would soon abandon its uber-easy policies.
MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan rallied 0.9% on Friday but was still down 2.9% for the week, the biggest weekly loss since mid-August.
