Money
Nepse loses more than 7 points
The Nepal Stock Exchange (Nepse) dipped 7.22 points to close at 982.65 points last week.In the three-day trading, the secondary market that opened at 989.87 points on Sunday dropped successively for the rest of the trading days.
Narendra Raj Sijapati, president of Nepal Stockbrokers’ Association, attributed the political cause as the main reason behind the fall in Nepse. “The market went up on Sunday following a call from Prime Minister Sushil Koirala for political consensus. The delay in holding dialogue between the two sides, however, led to low investor confidence during rest of the weekdays,” he said.
Five of the nine trading groups suffered a downswing in their indices last week. Hydropower companies dropped the most points, with the group’s index falling by 65.72 points. The groups representing hotels, commercial banks, insurance companies and development banks were other major losers over the week.
Only two groups posted gains. Indices of finance companies and trading groups increased 8.08 points and 8.03 points respectively. The benchmark index of manufacturing and ‘others’ remained stable at 1,427.27 points and 746.02 points respectively.
Along with the overall Nepse index, the sensitive index that measures the performance of blue chips companies also slid by 1.69 points to close at 208.76 points. Regarding the individual companies, Prabhu Bank topped in terms of both turnover amount and the shares units. The company witnessed turnover of Rs 85.7 million out of transaction of 268,000 shares. National Life Insurance, Nepal Investment Bank (Promoters’ shares), Chilime Hydropower Company and United Insurance Company (Nepal) were also among the top five companies in terms of the largest turnover amount.
With the index, the turnover at the secondary market also fell 34.22 percent to Rs 940.6 million last week.
Likewise, the volume of traded shares also dropped from over 3.4 million units to shed above 2.3 million. Sijapati attributed the fall in transaction amount to a longer stability of the secondary market. “Over the last few weeks, Nepse hovered between 980-990 points, losing investor confidence,” Sijapati said.
Top five companies in terms of turnover
Company Turnover (in Rs millions)
Prabhu Bank 85.78
National Life Insurance 55.35
Nepal Investment Bank (Pro) 48.79
Chilime Hydropower Co 31.19
United Insurance Co (Nepal) 27.21
Sectors that went up
Sector Points Gained
Finance Companies 8.08
Trading 8.03
Sectors that went down
Sector Points Gained
Hydropower Companies 65.72
Hotels 18.18
Commercial Banks 8.48
Insurance Companies 8.27
Development Banks 4.54