Kathmandu, November 5 Continuing its downward trend of last week, the Nepal Stock Exchange (Nepse) index shed 26.35 points or 1.73 per cent to retreat below the 1,500-point threshold today. Nepse has landed in bearish territory as the first quarter results of the financial institutions and upcoming provincial and parliamentary elections impelled investors to offload shares in the secondary market, according to share market analysts. “Large volume of supply in the market is the major reason behind the sharp decline of the benchmark index,” said Prakash Rajaure, stock market analyst. “Investors are not very optimistic about the market situation and are not willing to hold stocks bearing the burden of high interest rates on loans taken from banks.” Rajaure further said that the downbeat investor sentiment may continue till the results of the upcoming elections are disclosed. “The market has plunged as big investors are offloading shares to stay on the safe side before the elections and the market will rebound only when the big investors put in their investment in the country’s only trading bourse.” Opening at last week’s 1,522.92 points, the benchmark index was mostly southbound throughout the day before finally coming to rest at 1,496.46 points by the day’s closing. The sensitive index dropped 5.44 points or 1.7 per cent to 314.20 points and float index also fell 2.02 points or 1.84 per cent to 107.50 points. Apart from trading, which jumped by 2.7 points to 229.31 points, all the remaining subgroups recorded losses today. Both insurance and commercial bank sectors were the biggest losers as their sub-indices declined by 157.06 points and 24.29 points to land at 8,235.67 points and 1,277.02 points, respectively. Banking, the subgroup with highest weightage on the benchmark index, fell 1.87 per cent and insurance sub-index also dropped by 1.87 per cent. Share value of Prudential Insurance Company fell by Rs 66 to Rs 1,124, Bank of Kathmandu dropped by Rs 19 to Rs 416 and Siddhartha Bank fell by Rs 18 to close at Rs 388. The manufacturing sub index plunged by 2.07 per cent or 50.55 points to land at 2,396.88 points. Likewise, microfinance subgroup plunged by 1.68 per cent or 30.59 points to close at 1,787.67 points. Stock price of Swabalamban Laghubitta Bikas Bank declined by Rs 93 to close at Rs 1,437, among others. Hydropower and others sub-indices dropped by 1.3 per cent and 1.4 per cent to rest at 1,803.28 points and 817.60 points, respectively. Development banks also dropped 1.69 per cent or 30.91 points to 1,794.36 points. Stockholders of Kailash Bikas Bank saw their share value dive byRs 14 to Rs 266, and Green Development Bank took a beating of Rs 24 to rest at Rs 481. Similarly, finance was down 0.82 per cent or 6.37 points to 768.62 points due to Gurans Finance Company slumping by Rs 10 to Rs 170, among others. Of the 159 companies whose shares changed hands today, only 28 firms did not land in the red, namely, Arun Finance, Bhargav Bikash Bank, Bishal Bazar Company, Chhyangdi Hydropower, Karnali Development Bank, Lalitpur Finance, Laxmi Value Fund-1, Mahuli Samudayik Laghubitta Sanstha, Multipurpose Finance Company, Nepal Insurance Co, Ngadi Group Power, NIC Asia Bank, RSDC Laghubitta Bittiya Sanstha, Samata Microfinance Bittiya Sanstha, Shangrila Development Bank, Siddhartha Equity Oriented Scheme, United Modi Hydropower and SwarojgarLaghu Bitta Bikas Bank, among others. Among the 28 firms, share value of Citizens Bank, Nepal Investment Bank promoter share and Synergy Power, among others, remained steady. Altogether, 1.5 million scrips worth Rs 631.21 million changed hands today in 7,318 transactions.