Company portfolio fails to impress investors

HIMALAYAN NEWS SERVICE

KATHMANDU: Despite the fact that most listed companies earned more profits last fiscal year according to published financials, stock investors do not appear to be impressed this week –– August 12 to 16.

So far, those commercial banks that have published their reports have shown growth in their profits. Likewise, profits of hydropower companies have also grown by 30 per cent. Despite better prospects regarding dividends, the Nepse index lost 4.19 points.

Share prices of commercial banks and hydropower companies have all plunged in the week. The commercial banks’ subgroup lost 7.5 points and hydropower companies also went down by 19.91 points. Last week, expectations among investors regarding hydropower companies distributing handsome dividends pushed up the share prices and the transaction of the

hydropower companies.

Finance companies and development banks also plunged by 3.53 points and 3.33 points, respectively. Unilever Nepal earned Rs 560 per unit share pushing the manufacturing subgroup up by 29.01 points. Hotels and others subgroup also gained 0.38 points and 4.69 points, respectively.

The market that opened at 402.47 points on Sunday afternoon closed at 399.22 points by end of the day. The index steadily went down to 392.03 points till Wednesday, but on the last trading day of the week the benchmark index inched up to 398.28 points.

The stock exchange witnessed trading worth Rs 367.8 million of more than 1.3 million unit shares belonging to 117 companies in 6477 transactions, which is an increment of 34.55 per cent as compared to last week. Of the total transaction, blue chip stocks worth Rs 279.2 million were traded making the trading of class ‘A’ companies account for 75.91 per cent of the total transaction.

The sensitive index that measures the performance of blue chip stocks also slipped by 1.13 points. Likewise, the indicator of the performance of actual shares traded –– float index –– declined by 0.38 points to 30.65 points.

This week, Chilime Hydropower Company was the forerunner in terms of trading volume and transaction with trading of shares worth Rs 71 million in 606 transactions. Kist Bank topped in terms of number of shares traded with a transaction of 527,200 unit shares.

Top five performers of week were Chilime Hydropower (Rs 70.14 million), Kist Bank (Rs 60.40 million), Everest Bank (Rs 52.40 million), Bank of Kathmandu (Rs 22.74 million) and Nepal Telecom (Rs 15.32 million).