Wednesday 15 August 2012

STOCK MARKET UPDATE:15.08.2012



STOCK:
Karachi Stocks Up 77.75 Points:
KARACHI, Aug 15: The KSE-100 index was at 14989.72, up 77.75 points.(today 12.18 pm) 

August 11, 2012
5 TOP GAINERS  &  LOOSERS:

Colgate Palmoli
Rs 45.57
UniLever Pak
Rs (75.00)
Bata (Pak) Limi
Rs 34.00
Indus Motor Com
Rs (6.26)
Pak Oilfields
Rs 19.51
Exide (Pak)
Rs (5.19)
Mithchells Fruit
Rs 17.50
MCB Bank Ltd
Rs (4.66)
Pak Petroleum
Rs 10.25
Atlas Battery Ltd
Rs (3.82)

KSE recomposes KSE-30 index
KARACHI: The Karachi Stock Exchange (Guarantee) Limited has recomposed KSE-30 Index, effective from August 15, 2012.
According to KSE here Wednesday, Fatima Fertilizer Company, Engro Food Ltd and Jahangir Siddiqui & Co will replace ICI Pakistan, Lotte Pakistan and Nestle Pakistan.
The Index has been recomposed, based on the prices of June 30, 2012.
KSE said that the recomposition has been carried out on the basis of the pre-requisite or criteria of selection of companies from January 1, 2012 to June 30, 2012.

Company News:
1) Fertiliser body blames gas policy for woes: LAHORE, Aug 14: The unjustified distribution policy of natural gas has crippled the fertiliser sector in the last couple of years, reducing production of urea to bare minimum, compared with installed capacity, Shahab Khawaja, Executive Director, Fertiliser Manufacturers Pakistan Advisory Council (FMPAC) said on Tuesday.
Talking to the media, he discussed in detail, issues relating to the fertiliser sector on behalf of the newly established representative body of fertiliser plants in Pakistan.
The sector has become the biggest victim of flawed gas distribution policy, Khawaja said and that discriminatory policy of gas distribution to various sectors of economy has caused a severe blow to urea manufacturing plants besides rendering thousands workers jobless.
He said that farmers also had to pay a heavy price for unwarranted closure of fertiliser plants. In the last 18 months, he revealed, farming community also braved an additional burden of Rs53 billion on account of only one input i.e. urea fertiliser.
The fertiliser industry that had been set up several years back is facing a dismal future as manufacturing process has come to standstill due to lack of natural gas, he said.
The current installed capacity of 6.9 million tons per annum is sufficient to meet domestic demand of urea, Khawaja said as Pakistan is blessed with the ability to not only produce sufficient urea for domestic use but also enough to export a handsome quantity.
According to Khawaja, Pakistan is ranked 7th in the world in urea manufacturing capacity.
However, he lamented, a significant portion of this capacity is laying idle because of non-availability of natural gas, which is a raw material for manufacturing urea.
Urea production fell to just 4.4 million tons in 2012, against an installed capacity of 6.9 million tons.
Fertiliser plants located on SNGPL network were provided gas for only two month which amounts to gas supply of just one day per week, compared with gas supply of 3.6 days a week in 2011, according to Khawaja, and questioned how an industry can survive under these circumstances.
Owing to a slump in domestic production, Khawaja said, the government has to import vast quantity of urea which is an additional burden on national economy.
During January 2011 to June 2012 period, 2.2 million tons of urea worth Rs1.1 billion had been imported while federal government spent a subsidy of Rs57 billion on its sale to farmers on special rates.
The government last week also gave its approval to further import 300,000 tons of urea which will cost an additional burden on the national exchequer.
The financial health of fertiliser plants also worsened due to abnormal decrease in gas supplies, he said and fertiliser plants on SNGPL Network were forced to become loss making units from profitable units within a span of just one year.
There has been 32 per cent loss of revenue of such plants during first quarter 2011 to first quarter 2012 besides 133 per cent erosion in their profitability, he observed.
Financial position of SNGPL based plants was further aggravated in the second quarter as gas supply deteriorated and all 4 plants have now been closed for the past 3 months.
This situation is resulting in inability of companies to service their lenders.
Combined bank exposure of SNGPL based plant is approx. Rs150 billion. The workers of these plants have to bear the brunt of government policies in the shape of lay offs.
Agritech, one of the oldest fertiliser plants, has already filed a petition in labour court to lay off their work force of 3000 employees and other plants will also be forced to do so, if the situation does not improve.
Large scale plants with sophisticated and complicated equipment worth billions of dollars are getting wasted due to unjustified gas supply mechanism.
He continued to say that fertiliser sector is being discriminated badly. With fertiliser being downgraded in terms of priority of gas usage, gas is being directed towards CNG etc and the fertiliser industry is the only sector on the SNGPL network that presently has been given no gas at all.

MOHAMMED SALEEM MANSOORI

No comments:

Post a Comment