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Market indices fall despite Friday meeting hype

24 Jul 2012 - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

The hype about the outcome of the meeting President Mahinda Rajapaksa had with the market stakeholders at the request of certain stockbrokers and high net worth investors couldn’t boost the Colombo bourse yesterday, as all three market indices ended in the red.

The benchmark All Share Price Index lost 6 points (0.13%) to close at 4,881, while more liquid Milanka Price Index lost 24 points (0.55%) to close at 4,285. The new S&P SL20 Index also fell 0.24 percent or 6 points to close at 2,761.

The turnover for the day was Rs.322 million with a very thin share volume of 10.5 million.

Lanka Securities in its daily market report gave no credit to the President-market stakeholders meeting, but noted that even after the disbursement of the final tranche of the IMF StandBy-facility, the market continued to slide further.

“Most active counters for the day were Laugfs Gas nonvoting, HVA Foods and Free Lanka Capital Holdings. Top contributors to turnover were John Keells Holdings with Rs.122 million, Central Finance with Rs.78 million and Carson Cumberbatch with Rs.14 million,” Lanka Securities said.

According to Bartleet Religare, yesterday was a relatively quiet day for the markets, as the movement was narrow and the indices hardly moved within a range of 16 points, between the highs and lows of the day.

“Technically, markets remained sideways as no major price action was visible on Monday even after Friday’s meeting, suggesting that markets are consolidating at current levels with 4,725 as major support and 4,910 – 4,920 as immediate resistance levels. The broader range for the markets continues to be 4,725 on the lower side and 5,100 on the upper side. We are currently trading below the 14-day simple moving average,” Bartleet Religare said.

Asia Wealth Management in its daily report said that the bourse didn’t see any turn around yesterday, followed by the much awaited presidential meeting that was held last Friday.

“Even though the contentious issues for the prolonged bearish market were discussed at the forum, the deliberations or the outcome has not been clearly stated yet. Further, positive news such as the country receiving the IMF final tranche of US$ 415 million, coupled with the oversubscription of the US$ 1 billion sovereign bond, has not made any changes in the investors’ mind as they continue to be on the sidelines,” the report said.

The only silver lining for the bourse for the day was the net foreign inflow of Rs.178 million. Year-to-date foreign inflow stood at Rs.23.7 billion as of yesterday.

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Market indices fall despite Friday meeting hype

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