ECONOMYNEXT – Sri Lanka stocks edged up on Tuesday (27), recovering from a near two-week closing low with the index pushed up by banking and financial shares in high turnover and foreign inflows, dealers said.
The main All Share Price Index (ASPI) gained 0.18% or 17.41 points to close at 9,861.62, recocering from its lowst since September 13 hit on the previous day.
“The market moved up despite profit taking and margin calls on banking and financial sector,” a market analyst said.
Sri Lanka officials had a meeting with its external creditors on Friday (23) and they said a $2.9 billion IMF deal could come through in January 2023. However, the officials are yet to decide on domestic debts.
The market saw a turnover of 5.8 billion rupees, close to twice of this year’s average turnover of 3.27 billion rupees.
The bourse saw a net foreign inflow of 2.05 billion rupees on Friday. The inflow so far this year is 15.1 billion rupees after 16.5 billion rupees of net offshore buying in the last 30 consecutive sessions amid positive sentiment over an IMF deal.
The more liquid S&P SL20 index ended 0.24% or 7.62 points up at 3,164.51.
The main index ASPI has gained 8.7 percent in September so far after gaining 17.3 percent in August.
The index has lost 19.3 percent so far this year after being one of the world’s best stock markets with an 80 percent return last year when large volumes of money were printed.
Commercial bank pushed up the index, closing 4.6 percent higher at 54.6 rupees a share.
ACL Cables closed 9.7 percent up at 120 rupees and Hatton National Bank ended 3.4 percent up at 84.9 rupees a share. (Colombo/Sept27/2022)