Kathmandu, September 19

The country’s sole secondary market was mostly bullish during the trading week of  September 13 to 17, resulting in the Nepal Stock Exchange (Nepse) index surging by 27.31 points or 2.34 per cent to rest at 1,196.02 points.

Opening at 1,168.71 points on Sunday, the benchmark index gained 15.22 points by the day’s closing. The buying pressure continued for the next two days and Nepse added another 10.18 and 11.73 points on Monday and Tuesday, respectively.

In fact, on Tuesday, Nepse breached its previous record to close at an all-time high of 1,205.84 points. However, profit booking over the next two days caused Nepse to shed 3.03 points on Wednesday and 6.79 points on Thursday, to rest below the psychological level of 1,200 points for the week.

“Optimism related to the endorsement of the draft constitution resulted in the bull run in the beginning of the trading week,” explained Rabindra Bhattarai, a stock market analyst. “However, selling pressure was witnessed in the last two trading days.”

According to him, the stock market might witness some correction in the following days, but massive volatility is largely unlikely, especially as most of the banks and financial institutions have also submitted their plans on raising paid-up capital in line with the latest monetary policy.

In total, 6.6 million units of shares of 174 companies worth Rs 3.21 billion were traded during the week through 16,274 transactions. The traded amount was 47.93 per cent higher than the preceding week when 10,933 transactions of 5.46 million scrips of 162 listed firms amounting to Rs 2.17 billion had been undertaken.

The sensitive index, which gauges the performance of class ‘A’ stocks, rose by 6.25 points to 258.5 points. Similarly, the float index that measures the performance of shares actually traded also gained 2.33 points to close at 85.29 points during the review period.

While trading continued to hold steady at 206.99 points, manufacturing was the only subgroup to land in the red .

Reversing the previous week’s loss, hydropower was the top gainer this time around, as the sub-index rose by 4.37 per cent to 2,106.95 points. Chilime’s share value went up by Rs 76 to Rs 1,485, Ridi Hydropower’s by Rs 34 to Rs 440 and Butwal Power Co’s by Rs 18 to Rs 633, among others.

Banking, the sub-group with the highest stake in market capitalisation of Nepse, went up 2.93 per cent to 1,131.63 points. Stock price of Nepal Investment Bank was up Rs 34 to Rs 1,059, and of Himalayan Bank was up Rs 57 to Rs 1,400, among others.

Trailing close behind, development banks ascended by 2.78 per cent to 964.65 points. Chhimek Laghubitta Bikas Bank rose by Rs 29 to Rs 1,625 and Cosmos Development Bank by Rs 18 to Rs 335. Hotels recovered some of the loss of the previous week by rising 1.77 per cent to 1,944.33 points. TaragaonRegency’s share price dipped by nine rupees to Rs 248, but Soaltee’s and Oriental’s were both up Rs 10 each to Rs 455 and Rs 610, respectively.

Stock price of Nepal Telecom went up by Rs 11 to Rs 670, which in turn helped the others subgroup gain 1.67 per cent to 787.13 points.

Finance was up 1.49 per cent to 564.87 points, as Reliance Lotus Finance gained Rs 19 to Rs 190, while Progressive Finance closed at Rs 161, up seven rupees.

Insurance recorded a gain of 1.34 per cent to settle at 5,151.42 points, on the back of National Life Insurance surging by Rs 55 to Rs 2,340 and NLG Insurance by Rs 40 to Rs 760.

On the flip side, manufacturing dived by 5.12 per cent to 2,033.78 points, weighed down by Unilever Nepal’s share price dropping to Rs 28,910 (down Rs 2,090) and of Himalayan Distillery at Rs 556 (down Rs 48).

Nepal Investment Bank (Promoter Share) secured the top spot in terms of highest turnover with Rs 183.46 million.

National Life Insurance with Rs 176.51 million, NB Bank with Rs 154.66 million, NIC Asia Bank with Rs 143.41 million and Prime Commercial Bank with Rs 140.60 million rounded up the top five in this category.

Meanwhile, Arun Finance was the forerunner with regards to number of shares traded with 413,000 of its scrips changing hands. Prime Commercial Bank topped the chart in terms of transactions, clocking 672 deals.