Middle East War Shocks Pakistan Stock Market

Islamabad: (Web Desk) – Shockwaves from the escalating Middle East conflict sent Pakistan’s equity market into turmoil as the Pakistan Stock Exchange suffered a historic crash immediately after opening on Monday, according to local media reports.

The market reopened after the weekend closure during which US and Israeli forces launched large-scale strikes on Iran and assassinated Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Within the first hour of trading, panic selling erased nearly 15,000 points from the index.

The benchmark KSE-100 Index collapsed by 15,070 points, or almost 10 percent, plunging to 152,991.01 as investor confidence evaporated rapidly.

Heavy selling pressure dominated early trade as worsening geopolitical tensions in the Middle East compounded existing concerns over foreign capital outflows and global economic uncertainty. The steep fall wiped out billions of rupees in market value within minutes.

Out of 567 companies traded, only five managed to stay in positive territory, while 179 remained unchanged and 383 stocks recorded losses, reflecting broad-based investor panic.

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Following the sharp decline, trading at the exchange was automatically suspended under market regulations, with activity scheduled to resume at 10:22am.

Losses were recorded across all major sectors, including automobiles, cement, banking, fertilisers, oil and gas exploration, oil marketing companies, power generation and refineries. Heavyweight stocks such as HBL, MCB, MEBL, MARI, OGDC, POL, PPL, HUBCO and ARL all traded sharply lower.

Market sentiment had already been fragile during the previous week, as rising regional tensions and domestic security issues continued to pressure equities. Despite a modest rebound toward the end of last week on easing diplomatic signals, the benchmark index still closed 2.9 percent lower week-on-week, shedding over 5,100 points to end at 168,062.17.