Kathmandu, June 2:

Following a brief slowdown last week, stock trading at Nepal Stock Exchange (Nepse) has bounced back with the share prices of commercial and development banks climbing up.

As a result, Nepse index posted a sound growth of 16.46 points, one of the highest in the recent months, and closed at 541.38 points. The weekly trading opened at 524.92 points on Sunday and advanced further throughout the week. However, the country’s sole secondary market had closed lower last week.

The Nepse floor opened for five days under a regular lot and the trading continuously moved upward with its index closing at 525.94 points on the second day, 531.96 points on the third day and 540.67 points the fourth day before the market closed at 541.38 points on Thursday.

The weekly turnover, however, decreased this week to Rs 132.9 million with 295,052 unit shares having been traded through 1,387 transactions, against the last week’s figure of Rs 174.6 million through the trading of 449,320 shares. Out of the total 83 listed companies for share trading, 60 companies saw their transactions this week. The group wise share trading analysis shows that the major groups including commercial and development banks recovered with significant growth with all others except the insurance group registering a moderate growth. The insurance group is the sole loser this week.

The commercial banks group, which is the largest scrip by volume, bounced back with a gain of 23.60 points, as the group closed to 591.03 points from the opening 567.43 points. The group had lost about three points last week.

Likewise, the development banks group also posted a sound growth of 35.50 points, which is also one of the highest growth attained by a single group in recent weeks. The group’s trading closed at 483.90 points from its opening 448.40 points on Sunday.

Among the gainers, the finance group registered a growth of 3.83 points, as it closed higher at 448.91 points. The group began its trading at 444.08 points on Sunday. The other group, too, posted a growth of 4.95 points. The group’s index opened at 726.24 points on Sunday and closed at 731.19 points.

Albeit a marginal, the manufacturing and the hotel groups also earned growth and their index went up to 331.06 points and 238.71 points from the opening 330.70 points and 237.94 points respectively.

On the other hand, the insurance group continued to suffer a heavy loss, as the group’s index plunged by 10.01 points to land at 530.59 points on the closing day. The group, which had lost last week, too, opened at 540.60 points.

The trading group, meanwhile, remained constant at 155.21 points, as the group

didn’t have a single transaction throughout the week. Nepal Bangladesh Bank topped all other companies in monetary value from the shares traded

for the week. The bank’s transaction stood at Rs 12,830,550, while Shikhar Insurance Ltd outshone others for the highest number of transaction with

199 transactions. But, National Hydropower Co Ltd stood first in terms of number of shares traded for this week. A total of 50,130 unit shares of the company exchanged hands at the Nepse floor.

The Nepse floor remained open for five days under a regular lot, where the shares of Nepal SBI Bank, Nepal Bangladesh Bank, Everest Bank Ltd, Kumari Bank, National Hydropower Company and Shikhar Insurance were traded throughout the week.