Stocks slip for fourth day

Stocks registered losses for the fourth consecutive session amid choppy trading on Monday with lackluster trading.   The market swung between positive and negative several times throughout the session as investors played both sides of fence, dealers said. The benchmark DSE General Index, DGEN, closed at 4,359 with a drop of 46.6 points or 1%, hitting highest 4,450 in mid-session and lowest 4,351 in the final hour. The fall was the five-week low.   The free float-based benchmark, DSEX, was down 35 points or 0.9% to 4,055. The DSE30 dropped 24 points or 1.6% to 1,496. The Chittagong Stock Exchange Selective Category Index, CSCX, shed 84 points to 8,008.   Activity declined sharply as average turnover of last four sessions came down to Tk7bn. At the close of the session, the total DSE turnover stood at Tk6bn, down more than 28% over the previous session.    “Investors were seemed to be in search of comfort zone in recent sessions after a two and half months’ rally. As a result, panic rebounded alongside the turmoil in confidence,” said IDLC Investment in its daily market analysis.    Mimicking recent scenario, price wane in most of the overvalued scrips due to profit taking, further pulling down the market sentiment, it said. Losers outpaced gainers as out of 286 issues traded, 85 advanced, 178 declined and 23 remained unchanged.    All the major sectors ended in red except banks and pharmaceuticals that ended flat at 0.36%. The biggest losers were power, non-banking financial institutions and telecommunications dropping 2.6%, 2.37% and 1.20% respectively.   Lanka Bangla Securities said market continued to roll down as the investors’ seeking to book whatever profit left on the table.    It said overall turnover has declined by 28.69%, indicating sellers becoming uncertain whether they should offload at current level.    Oil marketing companies continued to dominate the turnover list with loss of market capitalisation.