Nepal Stock Exchange (Nepse) last week rose 7.65 points to close at 1,326.53 points.

The market that opened at 1,318.88 points on Sunday fell 6.68 points on Monday before posting gains for rest of the week. The week’s biggest gain of 10.76 points came on Thursday.

Stockbrokers attributed the rise to increasing investors’ attraction towards three sectors—commercial banks, insurance companies and microfinance institutions.

Bhuwaneshwor Yadav, managing director of Agrawal Securities, said investors are buying shares of banks and insurance companies in expectation of the issuance of right’s and bonus shares to boost their capital. Besides, good second-quarter results of commercial banks and easy availability of margin loans amid excess liquidity in the banking system also boosted investor confidence, he said.

As far as micro-finance institutions are concerned, the central bank is reportedly considering raising paid-up capital requirement for such institutions. “The reports have resulted in rising demand for the shares of micro-finance institutions,” said Ashok Kumar Jha, managing director of Aasutosh Brokerage & Securities.

Six of the nine trading groups posted gains, with the insurance group (up 199.61 points) leading the gainers’ side. It was followed by hotels, commercial banks, hydropower, others and finance companies.

The group representing development banks was down 17.65 points, while manufacturing and trading groups were stable at 1,998.78 points and 201.38 points, respectively. 

The sensitive index that measures the performance of ‘A’ class companies inched up 0.3 points to close at 285.23 points.

The overall transaction volume jumped 130.58 percent to Rs4.28 billion, while the number of traded shares increased to 6,714,230 units from 2,939,600.

Premier Insurance posted the highest individual transaction of Rs225.04 million. National Hydropower Company, Nepal Bank, Prudential Insurance and Agriculture Development Bank rounded out the top five. National Hydropower Company topped in terms of the number of shares traded—1,163,000 units.

Meanwhile, the Nepse listed right’s shares of Kanchan Development Bank, Gaumukhi Development Bank and Sana Kisan Bikas Bank. It also registered bonus shares of Kanchan Development Bank, Janaki Finance, Nirdhan Utthan Bank, Cosmos Development Bank and Global IME Bank.