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Bourse slide continues

25 Jul 2012 - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

For the third successive day, the Colombo bourse continued to slide as main indices ended in the red despite improved turnover levels and share volumes when compared with Monday.

The All Share Price Index lost 7.41 points to close at 4, 874 while more liquid Milanka Price Index fell 4.07 points to close at 4,282. The newly introduced S&P SL20 index also fell 1 point to close at 2761. The turnover for the day was Rs.520 million.

“The market behaviour shows that Friday’s meeting with the President bore no result. Whatever the boost the bourse could have got from the meeting would be immaterial and temporary,” an analyst on the grounds of anonymity said.

He also noted that due to the dull sentiment prevailing in the market, investors have not even reacted to the positive news such as the disbursement of the final tranche of IMF Stand-by facility and the oversubscription of the recent sovereign bond issue.

“There are a number of stocks which have dropped below their intrinsic value. It’s surprising as to why bargain hunters have not come to the market. It seems that foreigners have been the only party that has identified the changes, as they keep buying stocks creating a net inflow,” he pointed out.

Foreign participation was 38 percent of yesterday’s total market turnover, and net foreign buying amounted to Rs 251.4 million.

Commenting on the extra-ordinary absence of high net worth investors in the market, another analyst Mirror Business talked to said that most of them were stuck with speculative shares bought at higher prices during the previous market rally using margin facilities from banks.

Most active counters during yesterday’s trading were Laugfs Gas non-voting and HVA Foods PLC. The top contributors to turnover were Commercial Bank nonvoting with Rs.100 million, Dankotuwa Porcelain with Rs.54 million and Distilleries Co. with Rs.48 million.

Notable gainers for the day were Ascot Holdings which was up by 7.12 percent to close at Rs.200, Free Lanka Capital holdings, up by 5.56 percent to close at Rs.1.90 and Coco Lanka non-voting up by 3.63 percent to close at Rs.34.30.

Notable losers for the day were Laugfs Gas voting, which came down 4 percent to close at Rs.19.30, Nawaloka Hospitals, down by 3.45 percent to close at Rs.2.80 and Swarnamahal Financial Services, down by 3.13 percent to close at Rs.6.20.

In the meantime most Asian stocks fell after a private survey showed China’s manufacturing may contract at a slower pace this month and Moody’s Investors Service cut the credit outlook for Germany. The MSCI Asia Pacific Index fell 0.1%to 114.11 as of 7:06 pm in Tokyo.

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Bourse slide continues

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