KARACHI - Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) witnessed another bearish session on Thursday as the benchmark KSE 100-index, after trading between an intra-day high of 166 points and intra-day low of 853 points, closed at 44,823 points, declining by 590 points.

Pressure in the market was on the back of investors skepticism regarding the political scenario. Furthermore, Finance Minister Ishaq Dar conducted a media talk and clarified the 3% depreciation in the PKR against the greenback, citing 'miscommunication' among a few individuals as a cause of this rapid move, observed analyst at JS Global.

Major laggards of the index were LUCK (-2.43%), HUBC (-2.28%) and FFC (-3.36%). E&P sector lost value to close in the red zone on back of oil prices retreating by about 4 percent, ending their longest bull-run in more than five years. POL (-2.50%) and PPL (-1.07%) were the major loosers of the sector. Selling pressure was seen in the cement sector where POIC (-4.95%), LUCK (-2.43%) and DGKC (-1.66%) lost value to close in the red trajectory.

Panic selling was witnessed at PSX on investor fears over outcome of JIT interrogations of PM family and record surge in current account deficit to $10.64b for Jul-May '17, market participants said.

Stocks fell across the board on political uncertainty, record fall in rupee parity and concerns for higher taxation on corporate sector. Reports on dismal economic data on exports, foreign outflows and external account played a catalyst role in record fall at PSX, stated analyst Ahsan Mehanti. Volumes stood low at 146m shares versus 204m shares traded in the previous session. While traded value also declined to Rs8b/$87m.

Scrips of total 343 active companies participated in the session of which 265 closed in red, 67 in green while 11 remained unchanged.