Nepal Stock Exchange (Nepse) last week inched up 1.01 points. The benchmark index shed points in the first two days, before making some recovery in the last two days.

“The market has adopted a wait-and-see approach while some buyers are tapping opportunities created by the fall; thus, the market increased in the last two days,” said Harsh Agrawal, director of Agrawal Securities. “The market is not likely to fall in the upcoming days as the banking sector trudges forward with good financial performance.”

He said shares of commercial banks have become a safe haven for investors because of the financial strength and good performance of banks last fiscal year.

Of the nine trading groups, indices of five posted gains. The hotels group (up 62.96 points) was the biggest gainer, followed by insurance, finance and development banks. Of the three losers, hydropower and banking witnessed a downfall of 22.61 and 3.60 points, respectively. The trading group was stable at 202.79 points.

Stockbrokers attributed the rise in the insurance sub-index to reports about the Insurance Board’s (IB)

plan to make it mandatory for individuals to insure their homes, widening the insurers business scope. The sensitive index that measures the performance of ‘A’ class companies hovered around 374 points.

The transaction volume, however, dipped to Rs4.39 billion fromRs6.5 billion because of less trading days. The number of transactions also fell from 31,402 to 25,731.

Commercial banks led the charts in terms of turnover, with Nepal Bangladesh Bank posting the highest turnover of Rs310.63 million, followed by Nepal Investment Bank, Everest Bank and Nepal Bank.