PHOTO: FILEPakistan Stock Exchange (PSX), which had won the title of Asia’s best performing stock market in August 2020, took a U-turn and became the third worst performing market in the region amid the boiling political temperature and melting economy. The petroleum refinery was the worst-hit sector in terms of losing market capitalisation. The cement sector lost 24% of market capitalisation while automobile assemblers’ capitalisation went down 13% during Jul-Mar FY22, according to the Pakistan Economic Survey 2021-22. The latest data suggests that the PSX has become the second worst performing market in the region after Sri Lanka in the entire current fiscal year (Jul-Jun FY22), it has been learnt. In addition to this, the downgrading of Pakistan by the MSCI from the Emerging Market Index to the Frontier Market Index with effect from December 1, 2021 sparked selling pressure at the bourse.

Source: The Express Tribune June 10, 2022 11:24 UTC