Nepse index adds another 11.12 points

KATHAMNDU: Even as investors looked to book profits in the latter part of the trading week, the bull run witnessed in the first three days resulted in Nepal Stock Exchange (Nepse) index gaining 11.12 points or 1.20 per cent week-on-week to settle at 937.96 points, from June 7 to 11.

Opening at 926.84 points on Sunday, Nepse had added 4.33 points by the day’s closing. Investor optimism sustained on Monday, as the benchmark index surged by another 14.32 points. The news of political parties agreeing to form eight states in the country fuelled a massive bull run on Tuesday, with a 15-minute circuit breaker applied within 12 minutes of the market opening. Even as Nepse started dipping in the latter part of the day, the index had added 21.16 points during the day to rest at 966.65 points — a three-month high.

However, on Wednesday and Thursday, the local bourse dropped by 10.99 points and 17.7 points, respectively, as short-term investors sought to offload shares they had bought at a reduced price earlier.

The index dropped later in the week as investors went on a selling spree to book profit from the gains made in the previous days, according to Rabindra Bhattarai, stock market analyst. “It shows that investors don’t have confidence that market will boom in the coming days.”

Altogether 3.99 million units of shares of 154 companies worth Rs 1.62 billion were traded in the country’s sole secondary market through 10,776 deals. The traded amount was 25.40 per cent higher than the previous week, when 3.20 million scrips of 147 firms worth

Rs 1.29 billion changed hands through 9,152 deals.

The sensitive index rose by 2.7 points to 200.83 points. Similarly, the float index added 1.58 points to 67.13 points during the review period.

Insurance, hotels, trading and others subgroups recorded losses, whereas the rest of the subgroups witnessed gains.

Hydropower led the pack of gainers, rising by 51.82 points to 2,144.85 points. Chilime’s share value went up by Rs 35 to Rs 1,560, Butwal Power Co’s by Rs 30 to Rs 630 and Sanima Mai’s inched up by two rupees to Rs 690. Unilever’s scrips rose by Rs 815 to Rs 19,110, which helped the manufacturing subgroup add a hefty 40.66 points to close at 1,533.12 points.

Banking, the subgroup with the highest stake in market capitalisation, went up by 17.61 points to 827.29 points. Share value of Standard Chartered increased by Rs 50 to Rs 1,950, and that of Everest Bank by Rs 20 to Rs 2,035, among others.

Development banks added 12.93 points to rest at 777.68 points. Nagbeli’s stock price surged by Rs 221 to Rs 1,764 and Swabhalamban’s by Rs 60 to Rs 1,595.

Finance inched up by a marginal 2.93 points to 523.08 points. On the other hand, insurance — after surging by an impressive 440.32 points in the previous week — dived by 71.78 points to 3,861.85 points. Nepal Life Insurance’s shares closed at Rs 2,757, down Rs 73 and

National Life’s shed Rs 15 to rest at Rs 1,790.

Similar to previous week, hotels subgroup was southbound, dropping by 14.77 points to 1,844.79 points. Oriental’s and Taragaon’s scrips gained Rs 19 and five rupees to settle at

Rs 669 and Rs 271, respectively. However, Soaltee Hotel’s scrips losing eight rupees to Rs 412 weighed on the sub-index.

Trading shed 9.29 points to close at 220.54 points, primarily because of Bishal Bazaar Co’s scrips losing Rs 110 to be valued at Rs 2,280. Nepal Telecom’s stock price dipped by four

rupees to Rs 616, which dragged down the others subgroup by 4.7 points to 723.7 points.