Kathmandu, March 21 The country’s sole secondary market, which has been witnessing selling pressure since the past few weeks, dropped to a two-year low level today. The Nepal Stock Exchange (Nepse) index plunged by 24.4 points or 1.94 per cent to 1,231.07 points, which is the lowest after February 1, 2016, when it had closed at 1,238.02 points. Increasing rates in the banking sector and credit crunch have been the major factors for the downward pressure seen in the stock market, according to Ambika Paudel, a stock market analyst. “Along with this, the new government has not addressed anything related to the capital market that could boost investor sentiment,” said Paudel. Moreover, Paudel also informed that investors are unwilling to hold on to stocks by paying high interest rates on bank loans as they are not very optimistic with the current market situation. “Investor sentiment plays a major role in market movement and the current volatility is the result of wary investors,” he added. Today, the sensitive index dropped by 5.49 points or 2.05 per cent to 262.40 points, while the float index descended by 1.92 points or 2.13 per cent to close at 88.39 points. Apart from manufacturing, every sub-index landed in the red today. The manufacturing subgroup witnessed a growth of 58.48 points or 2.71 per cent to settle at 2,217.29 points. This was mostly on the back of Unilever Nepal’s share value surging by 6.11 per cent. On the other hand, banking subgroup — which has highest weightage in the benchmark index — fell by 22.11 points or 1.98 per cent to close at 1,095.85 points. Likewise, insurance plunged by 186.69 points or 3.12 per cent to 5,805.17 points, while microfinance took a dive of 48.52 points or 3.4 per cent to 1,378.60 points, respectively. Hydropower subgroup dropped by 22.7 points or 1.52 per cent to 1,468.23 points, while hotels fell by 23.31 points or 1.27 per cent to settle at 1,811.69 points. Finance and development banks managed to limit their losses to below one per cent. Finance dipped by 6.4 points or 0.98 per cent to 647.27 points and development banks shed 13.86 points or 0.94 per cent to 1,457.25 points. Top gainers Firms  Closing price  % change  Unilever Nepal 26,211 6.11 Goodwill Finance 129 3.2 Laxmi Value Fund-1 11 2.04 NLG Insurance 797 1.9 Jebils Finance 114 1.77 Top losers Firms  Closing price  % change Progressive Finance 150 -9.09 Mahila Sahayatra Mic Bittiya Sanstha 580 -6.71 Premier Insurance 916 -6.44 Nirdhan Utthan Bank 1,000 -6.4 Sagarmatha Insurance 1,180 -6.35 Source: Nepse