Stocks inched higher on Tuesday, after choppy trading, as investors were mostly cautious amid ongoing sluggish market trend.
Market analysts said investors remained worried about the recent volatility of the market and maintained cautious stance, taking the market in the flat territory.
A section of investors continued their selling binge on large-cap stocks like GP, BATBC, United Power, Square Pharma and Bank Asia, jointly contributed 12 points fall of DSEX, said a leading broker.
He noted that turnover dropped sharply to Tk 3.04 billion, indicates that investors were staying on the sidelines and observing the market movement.
The market opened on positive note and the key index of the major bourse rose about 20 points within first hour of trading. But late hour sale pressure led the prime index to close almost flat.
DSEX, the prime index of the Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE), settled at 4949, advancing 1.75 points or 0.03 per cent over the previous day.
The DSE Shariah Index also gained 1.51 points to close at 1,140. However, the DS30 index, comprising blue chips, saw a fractional loss of 0.21 point to finish at 1,759.
Turnover, a crucial indicator of the market, also fell to Tk 3.04 billion, which was 49 per cent lower than the previous day's six months highest turnover of Tk 5.95 billion.
The shaky investors opted to liquidate their holding of shares from telecom, bank, food and financial institution sectors to escape further losses, said International Leasing Securities.
The bargain hunters took position in June-ending stocks from textile, engineering, power and pharma sectors in the final hour which helped the index to close in green, said the stockbroker.
The telecom sector witnessed the highest loss of 0.91 per cent, followed by food with 0.57 per cent, banking 0.56 per cent and financial institutions 0.31 per cent.
On the other hand, engineering booked the highest gain of 0.95 per cent, followed by power with 0.36 per cent and pharmaceuticals 0.27 per cent.
Gainers took a modest lead over the losers as out of 352 issues traded, 183 closed higher, 113 ended lower and 56 remained unchanged on the DSE trading floor.
A total number of 100,234 trades were executed in the day's trading session with trading volume of 105.10 million shares and mutual fund units.
The market-cap of the DSE also fell slightly to Tk 3,737 billion on Tuesday, from Tk 3,738 billion in the previous session.
JMI Syringes topped the turnover chart with shares worth nearly Tk 122 million changing hands, followed by Beacon Pharma, Bangladesh Shipping Corporation, Stylecraft and National Tubes.
Miracle Industries was the day's best performer, posting a gain of 9.95 per cent while Mithun Knitting was the worst loser for the second straight day, plunging by 9.47 per cent.
The port city's bourse, the Chittagong Stock Exchange, also ended almost flat with its All Shares Price Index (CAPSI) -- CASPI-advancing 1.50 points to close at 15,048 and the Selective Categories Index - CSCX -gaining 0.34 point to finish at 9,140.
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