Regional war fears trigger tremors in stock market

By Hiran H.Senewiratne

CSE trading yesterday started on a negative note due to the ongoing conflict in the West Asian region, revolving around Iran and Israel. As a result the regional stock markets were disrupted somewhat, anticipating a global oil price hike, stock market analysts said.

The CSE adopted a cautious stance, with around 129 companies showing a downward trend in their prices while 87 companies’ stocks moved up. Further, Softlogic Holdings resumed its trading in the market after suspending its trading for some time due to some annual report issues, analysts added.

Amid those developments both indices moved downward. The All Share Price Index went down by 43.points, while S and P SL20 declined by 18.46 points. Turnover stood at Rs 1.47 billion sans a single crossing.

In the retail market top seven companies that mainly contributed to the turnover were, LOLC Finance Rs 169 million (27 million shares traded), Browns Investments Rs 72.2 million (12.9 million shares traded), Capital Alliance Rs 70.2 million (1.08 million shares traded), HNB Rs 68.5 million (361,000 shares traded), Softlogic Holdings Rs 67.9 million (6.4 million shares traded), Lanka Milk Food Rs 62.3 million (2.1 million shares traded) and Softlogic Capital Rs 54.8 million (7.8 million shares traded). During the day 112 million share volumes changed hands in 18000 transactions.

Yesterday the US dollar buying rate was Rs 296.87 and the selling rate Rs 306.59.