KATHMANDU, Dec 31: Nepal Stock Exchange (NEPSE) plunged 33.08 points to close at 2,576.50 points on Tuesday, the last day of 2024.
The notable decline in overall index was due to the heavy fall in sub-indices of development banks and finance companies. With the growing concerns over the balance sheets of a number of development banks and finance companies, the indices of these groups have been in declining trend for the past few days.
After Nepal Rastra Bank (NRB) took action against Karnali Development Bank a month ago, other development banks and finance companies are also under scrutiny of the central bank. Many of these B and C class financial institutions are found to be unveiling fake financial statements, hiding the actual figure of their bad debts and non-performing loans.
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As a result, the finance index and development bank index on Tuesday dropped by 5.19 percent and 2.77 percent, respectively. Janaki Finance and Pokhara Finance witnessed negative circuit breakers in their share transactions.
The secondary market opened at 2,609.58 points, went to a straight fall and hit the day’s low at 2,546.11 points until the last half an hour of trading time. The market recovered around 30 points in the remaining period before it closed for the day.
The sensitive index, which measures the performance of ‘A’ class companies, also fell 4.28 points. The daily turnover increased to Rs 5.67 billion from Rs 5.47 billion on Sunday. There was no trading in the secondary market on Monday due to the government announcing a public holiday to celebrate Tamu Lhosar.
Only ‘others’ out of the 13 groups added 1.19 points in its market index. Finance plunged by the largest of 152.44 points, while a total of five groups shed three-digit points in their market prices.
Among individual companies, 29 were gainers while 212 were registered as losers. Prabhu Bank Limited had the biggest turnover of its shares worth Rs 359.49 million.
Three companies including Support Microfinance Bittiya Sanstha, Janaki Finance Company Limited and Pokhara Finance Ltd were recorded as the topmost losers. NIC Asia Debenture 082/83 witnessed the highest gain of 6.10 percent in its market price.
