Nepse index northbound

Kathmandu, August 1

The massive demand for banking scrips propelled a bull run that saw the Nepal Stock Exchange (Nepse) index surge by 24.6 points or 2.45 per cent week-on-week to rest at 1,027.98 points, from July 26 to 30.

Starting the week at 1,003.38 points on Sunday, the benchmark index surged by 50.57 points by the day’s closing. The demand for stocks of commercial banks was so high that the market operator had to impose the circuit breaker twice during the day. The new provision unveiled in the Monetary Policy 2015-16 that requires commercial banks to ramp up their paid-up capital to Rs eight billion from the current Rs two billion had fuelled investor confidence.

Profit-taking on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday resulted in the Nepse index sliding by 7.55 points, 18.26 points and 6.81 points, respectively. However, a rise of 6.65 points on Thursday helped recover some of the losses.

All in all, 7.19 million units of shares of 174 companies worth Rs 3.03 billion were traded during the trading week through 15,416 transactions. The traded amount was a whopping 225.29 per cent higher than the preceding week when 1.92 million scrips of 163 listed firms worth Rs 932.40 million had changed hands through 5,912 transactions.

The sensitive index, which gauges the performance of class ‘A’ stocks, ascended by 6.74 points to 220.98 points. Similarly, the float index that measures the performance of shares actually traded also went up by 1.57 points to 73.5 points during the review period.

While hotels, hydropower and development banks landed in the red, the remaining subgroups recorded gains in the week.

Banking, the subgroup with the highest stake in market capitalisation, led the pack of gainers ascending by 44.37 points to 937.39 points. The share value of Everest Bank surged by Rs 232 to Rs 2,560 and of Standard Chartered by Rs 174 to Rs 2,330, among others.

Insurance climbed 37.7 points to 4,254.87 points as Nepal Life Insurance gained Rs 42 to Rs 3,000 and Life Insurance Co Nepal closed at Rs 2,901, up six rupees.

Adding to the previous week’s gain of 10.18 points, finance subgroup rose by 11.67 points to 542.15 points. Scrips of Narayani National Finance edged up Rs 19 to Rs 312; United Finance rose by Rs 44 to Rs 290.

Nepal Telecom’s share value went up by eight rupees, which in turn pulled up the others subgroup 9.4 points to 737.8 points.

Trading and manufacturing subgroups recorded minimal gains — inching up 3.46 points to 206.34 points and 0.38 points to 1,685.83 points, respectively.

Conversely, the hotels subgroup saw the previous week’s gain wiped out, as it slumped by 75.02 points to 1,848.49 points. Oriental’s scrips plummeted Rs 55 to Rs 600, Soaltee’s lost Rs 16 to land at Rs 425 and Taragaon dropped to Rs 255, down two rupees.

Hydropower continued on its downward trajectory, falling by 62 points to 2,144.68 points. Chilime’s shares slid by Rs 66 to Rs 1,572 and Ridi’s by Rs 30 to Rs 408.

After ascending by a healthy 54.68 points in the previous week, development banks closed down 13.82 points to 849.9 points.

Everest Bank came on top in terms of number of transactions and turnover, clocking 577 deals amounting to Rs 224.49 million. Nabil Bank with Rs 175.98 million, Global IME Bank with Rs 123.53 million, Sanima Bank with Rs 114.23 million and Nabil Bank (Promoter Share) with Rs 112.4 million rounded up the top five spots with regards to revenue.

Siddhartha Investment Growth Scheme-I was the forerunner in number of shares traded with 1.07 million units of its scrips changing hands.