Stocks ended flat yesterday, as late profit booking cut early gains.

Strong rally in heavyweight banks and telecommunications offset profit taking losses in other sectors, including cement and power.

The Dhaka Stock Exchange benchmark index, DSEX, closed at 4924 with a slight rise of 11 points or 0.3%, extending its gaining streak for the fifth straight session.

But the Shariah Index, DSES, was marginally down 4 points or 0.4% to 1,149. The comprising blue chips DS30 fell 11 points or 0.7% to 1,889.

Chittagong Stock Exchange (CSE) Selective Categories Index, CSCX, ended at 9,299 with a rise of 81 points.

 Buoyant trading continued at the DSE as the turnover stood at Tk992 crore with over 1% higher than the previous session.

Investors continued favoring pharmaceuticals which captured the highest trading value, followed by the engineering and energy sectors. 

Among the major sectors, the banks posted the highest return of more than 2.4% while the most profit booking took place in the cement sector shedding 3.4%. 

The telecommunications rose 2%, followed by power, pharmaceuticals and non-banking financial institutions, which edged higher.

LankaBangla Securities said the trading can be seen as a day of consolidation as stocks fluctuated throughout the day before eventually ending the session mixed. 

It said investors presented mixed trading behavior taking profit on stocks, those rallied earlier in the previous sessions while taking position on financial and manufacturing stocks. 

IDLC Investments said despite the nation-wide strike for the consecutive three working days, equity market continued to advance amid heightened turnover. 

Investors remained active, as the turnover remained robust, it said. 

The debutant RSRM Steel jumped over 93% to Tk77 a share on its offer value, making it the highest traded stocks.

Out of 303 issues traded at the DSE, 54 posted more than 3% gain and 26 lost more than 3% over the previous day.

Zenith Investments said the market reversed its course of direction in early trade hour, but recovered quickly with huge turnover volume. 

It said much of the credit goes to the banks and financial institutions that fuelled the growth of the main index and made the market more lucrative to the investors.