KARACHI - The Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX) witnessed range bound session on first trading session of the week with shares index made moderate gains of 71.82 points and close at 48,227.75 points.

Market opened on a positive note and retained its previous swing as the index traded between an intraday high of 228 points and intraday low of 35 points to finally close by at 48,228 level, brokers said.

Mixed sentiment was witnessed in the banking sector where pressure was seen in the sector across the board during the initial hours of trade but later on some recovery came on the back of CPI numbers that clocked in at 4.94 percent for the month of March 2017 versus 4.22 percent recorded in last month. In the aforementioned sector, UBL (gain 3.02pc) and MCB (0.48pc) managed to close in the green zone whereas HBL (slip 0.63%) closed lower. INDU (5.00pc) and HACR (3.78pc) in the automobile gained to close in the green zone.

INDU gained as the automobile assembler disclosed its Rs4 billion investment plan to expand its annual production capacity. HACR on the other hand gained on the back of the news that total sales for the company during March end FY17 stood at 35,300 units which is the highest ever sales figure achieved by the company. HASCOL (-2.32pc) extended its loss on the back of its 2016 result announcement on Friday in which the company posted EPS of Rs10.07 along with a final cash dividend of Rs3.5/share taking the total payout for 2016 to Rs7/share, observed analyst Nabeel Haroon.

Volumes dried-up by 41 percent d/d to 159.9 million shares, while trade value decreased by 19 percent to Rs9.6 billion/$91.2 million. Scrips of 380 companies were traded, of which 137 gained in value, 229 declined and 14 remained unchanged.

Volume was led by Aisha Steel Mill with 15.89 million shares traded, Bank of Punjab with 11.77 million shares traded and Azgard Nine with 11.4 million shares traded remained in spotlight in the session.