Stocks closed marginally higher amid volatility yesterday, breaking their five straight days of losses.
The market started the day with a positive note, but went into red immediately with benchmark index DSEX falling below 4,300-mark.
However, some buys from mid-session offset all the losses seen in the morning.
The benchmark index DSEX rose 9 points or 0.3% to end at 4,311, recovering from its previous session’s 11-month low.
The Shariah index DSES inched 1 point up to 1,046. The blue chip comprising index DS30 witnessed a fractional gain of 0.9 points to 1,631.
The Chittagong Stock Exchange Selective Category Index CSCX was up only 20 points to 8,077.
The volume of trade in value was just over Tk300 crore on DSE, marginally up 1.7% over the previous session.
Modest rally in banks, engineering and power helped the indexes close positive.
But non-banking financial institutions and food and allied, telecommunication and pharmaceuticals continued to post losses.
Tannery sector showed the highest turnover increase of 124%, led by Apex Footwear’s dividend declaration while food and allied showed the highest turnover loss of 41%.
Pharmaceuticals and chemicals had the highest contribution of 22.2% in turnover.
Square Pharmaceuticals topped the turnover leader with shares worth Tk13.7 crore changing hands, followed by Orion Infusion, BSRM Limited, Aman Feed and Emerald Oil.
Lanka Bangla Securities said stocks got off to a choppy start this morning, but managed to make a little progress in the afternoon.
It said after a sharp cut in index in previous session, the benchmark index was relatively flat, adding a few points during the session.
Strength was found in the financial sector as well as in the consumer and pharma stocks, it said, adding that there were a couple of noteworthy economic releases yesterday which grabbed the eyes of market players, specifically, the government decision to reduce the price of furnace oil relating to global price level.