Nepal Stock Exchange (Nepse) index, which opened at 499.99 points on Sunday, fell 3.11 points, or 0.62 percent, over the week to close at 496.88 points on Thursday -- the last trading day of the week -- with banking sector underpinning the slide. [break]
Nepse´s weekly report shows shares of most of the leading commercial banks taking moderate dips. Shares of Nabil Bank, for instance, fell Rs 5 over the week to close at Rs 1745 on Thursday, while Everest Bank saw its share value decline by Rs 10 to Rs 1546. Shares of Nepal Investment Bank, on the other hand, slipped Rs 13 to end the week at Rs 720, while stocks of Himalayan Bank closed at Rs 716 on Thursday, down from opening price of Rs 728.
Falls taken by these companies led the banking sub-index to drop to 492.79 points on Thursday from Sunday´s opening of 496.38 points.“The moderate declines in share prices are minor corrections that take place all the time. So investors should not be worried,” Stockbroker Anjan Poudel said. “We are happy that the benchmark index is hovering at 500-point level and we are not witnessing indiscriminate fluctuations.”
Another reason that contributed to this week´s decline in the benchmark index is the fall in share price of Nepal Telecom, a stock market heavyweight. The share price of the state-run telco fell to Rs 534 on Thursday from Sunday´s opening of Rs 545.
Despite the fall in benchmark index, share trading amount grew by 5.73 percent to Rs 356.48 million over the week.
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