Stocks plummet amid earnings uncertainty

The stock market suffered a sharper fall on Monday extending the losing streak to the fourth consecutive session. 

Rising coronavirus infections and an uncertain corporate earnings scenario provoked nervous investors to book profits or minimise losses through reducing their stock holdings, said the stockbrokers. 

The market started on a high note, but morning optimism failed to sustain as risk-averse investors engaged in a selling frenzy since the recent quarterly earnings disclosures enticed them to book profits, EBL Securities wrote in their daily market commentary.

Analysts of the top-tier brokerage firm also observed portfolio rebalancing tendency in the market as many investors are changing their stocks based on the updated quarterly earnings of listed companies. 

However, due to sellers' dominance on the trading screens, DSEX, the broad-based index of the Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE), fell by 0.93% to 6,926 points on Monday. 

Through a four-week recovery move, the index rose to 7,136 points on 20 January, from 6,610 on 26 December 2021. 

Only 72 scrips advanced, 264 declined, and 44 remained unchanged in the DSE on Monday. 

As the investors' participation declined in the daily trading activities, turnover in the DSE declined to Tk1,215 crore, from Tk1,333 crore on Sunday. 

The engineering sector contributed a maximum of 13.9% of the daily turnover in the DSE, while pharmaceuticals and textile sectors were in the next two spots with more than 12% turnover contribution each. 

All the sectors except jute suffered market capitalisation contraction on Monday. Of them, tannery, life insurance, and ceramic observed the maximum corrections. 

CSCX, the broad-based index of the Chittagong Stock Exchange (CSE), fell by 0.93% to 12,194 on Monday. Turnover slightly increased to Tk24.39 crore in the port city stock exchange.