The stock market of Nepal plunged to 6 months low in the review period as gloomy political winter cooled investors’ sentiment. The Nepse index lost 61.84 points or 6.69% to rest at 862.5 while the session’s high was on 27 Oct with 935.01 and lowest was on 18 Nov with 844.06. 

 

Failure of political parties to settle their differences over the new constitution had a heavy toll on the Nepali stock market. Added to it was the confusion regarding different aspects of the central depository system that is being implemented in the stock market. As a result, the stock index went down below six months low. The index was hovering near 866 on 28 May, 2014. And it closed the last month at 862. 

 

Worse, it was not only the index that was down. Also the total turnover over the period was down by 28.13% indicating that new investors are shying away from the market. New as well as existing investors hope that the market will further slide down, thus causing them to hold their decision. 

 

CDS and Clearing Company had earlier declared that it was to start clearing of commercial banking stocks through CDS after Dashain festivals. But while that deadline was approaching, it proposed Securities Board to implement it in a phased manner so that the full implementation would be completed on 15 April 2015. One more reason for the downfall may be that as most of the companies have already declared their returns, the price adjustment period is going on. That means, the stocks can experience further downfall for few upcoming sessions.   

 

Performance by Sector

During the review period, the hydropower sector lost 296.30 points or 12.35% to close at 2103.8. The commercial banking sector plummeted 69.53 points or 8.53% to rest at 745.47. The insurance sector skid 4.98% followed by 4.30% down in development banks group. ‘Others’ sector went downhill 17.62 points or 2.44% to 704.91 while finance companies sector lost 11.93 points or 2.43% to close at 478.18. However, the manufacturing sector added 29.77 points or 2.47% to 1233.59 while the trading sector remained flat for the period.  

 

Sensitive index for blue chip companies descended 13.33 points or 6.75% to 184.16 while float index plummeted 4.88 points or 7.53% to 59.9. The market capitalization for the review period declined by 6.71% to Rs 884.95 billion and turnover was down by 28.13%.  

The total volume of trade for the review period was dominated by commercial banks as usual as shown in the accompanying figure. This group accounted for 42.98% of total trade. The insurance sector acquired 21.82%, development bank 14.91% and hydropower sector 11.57%. Rest of the trade was shared by the other sectors. 

 

Technically, the Simple Moving Average (SMA) remained suppressed by 30-day SMA and 200-day SMA pushing Nepse index deep down. Since index is trying to gain the position over 200-day SMA, small upside correction is possible.