By Bikram Chitrakar
 

Secondary market slipped off the trend as political dealings and uncertainty cooled down investor’s sentiment. The benchmark Nepse index receded 19.73 points or 3.86% to settle at 510.88 while the session’s high was on 3rd Jan with 533.46 and lowest was on 20th Jan with 508.23.


Growing political ambiguity and actions of opposition parties to hit the road with protest programmes against the government pulled the confidence level of the investors in the first month of 2013. The presence of Investors presence was discouraged by sequence of these events. Decrease in the turnover suggests the battered confidence of the investors.


Market actions, as the second quarter reports of the listed companies started coming, indicated negative evaluation from the investors of these reports. This was particularly so of the banking and financial institutions.


Securities Board of Nepal (SEBON) has issued directives to check the money laundering. This Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-terrorist Financial Directive 2069 provides that securities business person should inform the authorities if the daily transaction of an individual and firm exceeds Rs 1 million. Similarly, other capital market participants are also ordered to keep proper records so as to detect if the source of the investment is suspicious.


Performance by Sector

Commercial banking sector with dominant volume of trade in Nepal stock exchange descended 29.40 points or 5.98% to rest at 491.48. Hydropower sector skid 62.29 points or 6.33% to 983.9. Others sector lost 15.27 points along with 13.54% down in development bank to 763.65 and 245.94 respectively. Similarly, hydropower sector plunged 62.29 points or 6.33% to rest at 983.9 while finance sector went downhill 9.53% to 250.51. However hotels sector added 84.80 points or 12.51% to close at 677.8. Insurance sub-index gained 70.68 points or 8.67% to 815.24. Manufacturing sector moved higher by 9.04 points to rest at 860.13.

Sensitive index that measures the performance of 133 blue chips scrip at secondary market cut off 1.80 points or 1.35% to 133.52 while the float index calculated on the basis of real transaction descended 1.30 points or 3.73% to 34.83. Total of Rs. 1,780,346,071 turnover was realized during the review period from 6,228,761 units of shares traded via 23354 transactions.

The accompanying figure depicts the sector-wise distribution based on the total volume of trade. As usual, commercial banking sector accounted for 77.39% of total trade. Hydropower sector occupied 6.86% while development bank grabbed 5.87% and remaining sectors made up for the rest.

Technically, the Simple Moving Average (SMA) showed shabby conditions in the short term as Nepse Index surged above the 30 Days SMA. However, in long term the 200 Days SMA seems helpless despite  roaring movements. Key resistance test at the level of 510 can determine the further movement and new target level.
Chitrakar is a Stock Analyst with Jamb Technologies Pvt Ltd.