Stocks slipped back into the red on Monday, after single-day break, as investors opted for profit-motivated sell-offs.
Brokers said the market faced late hours' selling pressure as investors opted for profit booking in major sectors, particularly banking, financial institutions and telecommunication sectors after recent price surge.
However, most of the insurance stocks surged on the day despite the market fell as investors are increasingly shifting their focus on the insurance sector, said a leading broker.
Out of 47 insurance companies, 30 closed higher, 13 lower and four remained unchanged. The insurance sector also surged 1.70 per cent.
The market opened on positive note and the core index crossed the 5900-mark within first 10 minutes of trading. But later it went down steadily.
At the end of the session, DSEX, the prime index of the Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE), settled at 5,859, losing 27.97 points or 0.47 per cent, hitting 11-month high in the previous day.
The two other indices also finished marginally lower. The DS30 index, comprising blue chips, fell 8.19 points to finish at 2,021 and the DSES (Shariah) index lost 3.06 points to settle at 1,315.
Turnover, another important indicator of the market, also fell to Tk 8.85 billion, which was 8.66 per cent lower than the previous day's turnover of Tk 9.69 billion.
A total number of 196,322 trades were executed in the day's trading session with trading volume of 246.16 million shares and mutual fund units.
The market-cap of the DSE stood at Tk 4,152 billion which was Tk 4,162 billion in the previous day.
Agrani Insurance Company topped the chart of top gainers. The company's share price rose 9.82 per cent or Tk 3.30 to close at Tk 36.90 each on Monday.
The company's share price soared 91 per cent or Tk 17.60 in eight sessions in a row as of Monday.
In response to DSE queries, some insurance companies recently have informed that there was no undisclosed price sensitive information for recent unusual price hike of prices.
Asked, the managing director of a leading merchant bank said on anonymity that small cap companies normally dominate the chart of top gainers.
The port city bourse Chittagong Stock Exchange also backed to the red with the CSE All Share Price Index - CASPI - losing 84 points to settle at 17,981 while the Selective Categories Index - CSCX -shedding 54 points to finish at 10,864.
Here too, the losers beat the gainers as 152 issues ended lower, 106 higher and 20 remained unchanged.
The port city bourse traded 11.48 million shares and mutual fund units worth more than Tk 326 million in turnover.
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