Nepse ends 2016-17 in green territory

Kathmandu, July 15

The stock market managed to end the last week of fiscal year 2016-17 on a positive note, but barely, as the monetary policy for fiscal 2017-18 unveiled by Nepal Rastra Bank dashed the expectations of pro-market policies. The Nepal Stock Exchange (Nepse) index inched up by 0.56 point or 0.03 per cent to rest at 1,582.67 points.

Share investors’ sentiment had been boosted the previous week on hopes of a pro-market monetary policy. “However, the monetary policy failed to address the concerns of investors like high interest rate and credit crunch, which is why the market movement was relatively muted,” explained Anjan Paudel, former president of Stock Brokers’ Association of Nepal.

The issue of value added tax (VAT) on share transaction has remained unresolved, which has also dampened the confidence of investors. Investors were also under pressure to settle their loans at the end of the fiscal year, which was a drag on market growth, according to Paudel. “A majority of investors have invested in the secondary market with borrowed funds and they were under pressure to settle the loan amount, which also affected the market,” he added.

The Nepse index had opened at 1,582.11 points on Sunday and had gone up by 2.04 points by the closing time for the day. It dropped by 8.93 points on Monday to reach 1,575.22 points, but recovered the loss the very next day by rising 9.79 points to 1585.01 points on Tuesday. The local bourse continued northbound on Wednesday by adding 2.55 points, but shed some of the gains on Thursday by dipping 4.89 points to 1,582.67 points.

In the week, sub-indices of banking, manufacturing and others went up whereas development bank, finance, insurance, hydropower and hotels landed in the red. Trading held steady at 212.76 points.

The sub-index of hotels recorded the biggest plunge of 2.28 per cent or 51.96 points to land at 2,221.57 points. Share price of hotels like Soaltee declined by 1.99 per cent to Rs 361, Oriental fell by 2.91 per cent to Rs 654 and Taragaon Regency slipped 0.77 per cent to Rs 261.

Banking subgroup — the share market heavyweight — gained 0.44 per cent or 6.22 points to 1,418.81 points. Stock price of commercial banks like Nabil, Nepal Investment and NMB went up in this week. Share price of Nabil rose by 1.53 per cent to Rs 1,523, while that of Nepal Investment advanced by 1.71 per cent to Rs 770.

During the review period, the sub-index of manufacturing sector went up by 9.89 points or 0.42 per cent to 2,366.58 points, which was followed by others sector with an increment of 1.21 per cent or 8.39 points to 699.62 points.

Sub-index of hydropower declined by 1.13 points to 1,918.01 points. Likewise, insurance sector sub-index fell by 0.55 per cent to 8,350.29 points. Finance and development banks index also dipped in the week. The finance sub-index closed at 729.62 points, down 1.79 per cent or 13.3 points, while development banks shed 0.43 per cent or 8.36 points to rest at 1,945.37 points.

During the review period, 11.43 million shares of 168 companies were traded through 32,245 transactions. The total trading amount increased by 59.43 per cent in the week to Rs 4.2 billion, against

Rs 2.63 billion in the previous week. Promoter shares of Nabil Bank recorded top turnover with Rs 302.94 million, followed by Nepal LifeInsurance with Rs 253.83 million, Soaltee Hotel with Rs 160.22 million, Nepal Credit and Commerce Bank with Rs 143.07 million and Forward Community Micro Finance with Rs 139.88 million.

NMB Sulav Investment Fund secured the top spot with regards to trading volume with 2.7 million of its scrips changing hands. Nepal Life Insurance remained on the top in terms of number of transactions with 2,758 transaction.

In the week, sensitive index was down by 0.02 per cent to 336.04 points whereas the float index went up by 0.02 per cent to 116.14 points.