Nepal Stock Exchange (Nepse) shed 30.86 points, or 2.3 percent, over the week to close at one-year low of 1,315.13 points, as uncertainty in the new government’s policies sent jitters through the share market.

The market had even fallen below 1,300-point mark during the week. However, Nepse was successful in making a quick recovery, as demand for shares rose. 

This is the third consecutive week of freefall observed by Nepse. Over the last three weeks, the stock market has lost 110 points. 

The market that opened at 1,345.99 points on Sunday shed 41.56 points to close at 1,304.43 points. On Monday, the market lost another 16.69 points to end the day at 1,287.74 points. 

Nepse incurred these losses after Finance Minister Yubaraj Khatiwada called stock market “an unproductive sector”, according to stockbrokers. 

“After this remark was made, the market went on a selling spree, on suspicion that the government would introduce stern policies for the stock market,” said a stockbroker on condition of anonymity.

On Tuesday and Wednesday, the market, however, gained 8.7 points and 18.69 points, respectively. The market made a rebound after the government said it would “issue a white paper on current state of economy”, stockbrokers said. The white paper, according to many, would try to address problems faced by various sectors, including the secondary market. 

“Also, the success achieved by CDS and Clearing in allotting Aarambha Microfinance’s primary shares in a record 37 hours with the enforcement of C-ASBA platform has propped up investor confidence,” the stockbroker said.  

The market remained closed on Thursday due to public holiday. 

With the fall in Nepse index, the sensitive index, which measures the performance of Group ‘A’ companies, also shed 5.92 points over the week to close at 279.46 points. 

The losses witnessed by Nepse erased Rs34.53 billion off the stock market over the week, as market capitalization, which stood at Rs1,574.06 billion when the market opened for the week on Sunday, fell to Rs1,539.53 billion by the end of the week. 

At the end the week, all 10 trading groups were in the red. Insurance sector was the biggest loser. It lost 209.01 points over the week to close at 6,468.34 points. Among others, manufacturing sub-index shed 90.8 points, followed by hotels (down 78.36 points), microfinance (down 58.12 points), hydropower (down 55.1 points) and ‘others’ (down 26.31 points).

Similarly, commercial banks lost 19.2 points, development banks shed 12.97 points, finance companies lost 10.12 points and trading group shed 2.96 points. 

With the fall in these indices, the transaction amount fell 8.61 percent to Rs1.8 billion during the week. According to Nepse, the traded number of shares, however, went up during the week to 4.8 million units from 4.5 million units in the previous week.  

The top company in terms of share transaction amount during the week was Nepal Life Insurance. The company’s shares worth Rs111.86 million changed hands during the week. Next in line was Sanima Bank, which saw transaction of shares worth Rs70.19 million, followed by Nabil Bank, Standard Chartered Bank and Nepal Bank Limited.

Sanima Bank led in terms of traded number of shares. A total of 201,000 units of shares of the bank were traded during the week. Last week, stocks of 171 listed companies were traded.