Stocks extended rally for the second straight session on Wednesday, with the key index of the main bourse crossing 7,000-mark after three days.
The market opened on a high note and the core index rose about 58 points within the first hour of trading. But the morning optimism later wiped out most of the early gains as the cautious investors went for profit booking.
Finally, DSEX, the core index of the Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE), went up by19.15 points or 0.27 per cent to settle at 7,016. The benchmark index added over 90 points in the past two trading days.
Market analysts said stocks extended the rally as the buoyant investors, beating the Covid-19 worries, continued to pour their funds into large-cap stocks.
Investors hope that the economic activities of the country will continue as usual riding on favourable macroeconomic indicators, according to a merchant banker.
He noted that the investors remained upbeat as some listed companies posted higher-than-expected quarterly earnings results.
Price appreciation of several large-cap stocks such as Robi, Square Pharma, BRAC Bank, Fortune Shoes and United Power kept the market afloat, he said.
Robi, Square Pharma, BRAC Bank, Fortune Shoes and United Power jointly contributed 17 points rise to the DSEX, according to amarstock.com, a market data analyst.
Higher-than-expected earnings of some of the listed companies encouraged investors to put fresh funds on stocks, according to a leading broker.
Stocks kept the winning streak pushed by investors' buying spree as they cheered over better earnings growth reported by companies in their most recent quarterly earnings reports, said EBL Securities.
Two other indices also edged higher with the DS30 index, comprising blue chips, rising 4.20 points to finish at 2,592 and the DSE Shariah Index gaining 6.50 points to close at 1,503.
Turnover, an important indicator of the market, stood at Tk 12.66 billion, which was 6.36 per cent lower than the previous day's tally of Tk 13.52 billion.
Major sectors posted mixed performances with telecom logging the highest gain of 0.50 per cent, followed by pharma (0.40 per cent), power (0.40 per cent) and banking (0.10 per cent).
On the other hand, cement, non-bank financial institutions, food and engineering suffered losses of 0.90 per cent, 0.60 per cent, 0.10 per cent and 0.10 per cent respectively.
Gainers took a strong lead over the losers as out of 381 issues traded, 204 ended higher, 126 closed lower while 51 remained unchanged on the DSE trading floor.
A total number of 229,257 trades were executed in the day's trading session with a trading volume of 289.48 million shares and mutual fund units.
The market capitalisation of the DSE also rose to Tk 5,620 billion on Wednesday, up from the previous day's mark of Tk 5,611 billion.
Beximco - the flagship company of Beximco Group- topped the turnover chart with shares worth Tk 972 million changing hands, closely followed by Bangladesh Shipping Corporation (Tk 585 million), Fortune Shoes (Tk 374 million), Orion Pharma (Tk 364 million) and Bangladesh Building Systems (Tk 290 million).
Rupali Life Insurance was the top gainer, posting a 10 per cent rise, while Samorita Hospital was the worst loser, losing 5.95 per cent.
The Chittagong Stock Exchange also ended marginally higher with its All Shares Price Index (CASPI) rising 43 points to close at 20,566 while the Selective Categories Index - CSCX-- gained 24 points to close at 12,353.
Of the issues traded, 170 advanced, 101 declined and 34 issues remained unchanged on the CSE.
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