PSX Gains Over 3,600 Points as Investors Bet on IMF Meeting and Diplomatic Efforts

A day after registering its worst ever day in history, the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) was all green on Friday, gaining over 3,600 points. Despite tensions with India persisting for now, investors pinned their hopes on international diplomatic efforts to reduce escalation and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) meeting happening later in the day to approve the immediate disbursement of around $1 billion to Pakistan under the ongoing Extended Fund Facility and an additional arrangement for the $1.3 billion Resilience and Sus­tainability Facility (RSF). At close, the benchmark KSE-100 index gained 3,647 points to close at 107,174 points, up 3.4 percent over the previous closing. The 100-index had plunged by 6,482 points or 6.26 percent on Thursday. A total of 516,295,988 shares were traded during the day as compared to 651,894,137 shares the previous trading day, whereas the price of shares stood at Rs. 28.84 billion against Rs. 35.4 billion on the last trading day. As many as 441 companies transacted their shares in the stock market, 300 of them recorded gains and 99 sustained losses, whereas the share price of 42 companies remained unchanged.