Markets Today

The 30-Second Read

• NEPSE closed 2,531.55, down 13.85 (−0.54%), a second consecutive decline. 2,542.77 support broke. The market is now 9.00 points above 2,522.66 and 18.13 above the 31 August coverage low.

• Breadth got worse: A/D 0.34 (67 advancers, 200 decliners) from 0.39. Every sub-index closed red for a second straight session.

• LEC closed limit-up at +15.00% on Rs 45.49 crore of turnover, 11.4% of the entire market's Rs 4.00 arab and 19.27 lakh shares. Top of both activity tables. On a day 200 of 282 names fell, one stock absorbed one rupee in nine.

• RSML's three-day streak ended: −2.77% to 2,910.00. The block did not print. Yesterday's note said to watch the block more than the price; the block vanished and the price broke on the same session. Rotation sixteen.

• SBI printed three identical Rs 4.01 crore blocks 100,000 units each, the exact recurring placement pattern flagged in this report's standing rules. Average deal size rose to Rs 90,576, the highest since early August.

• Turnover Rs 4.00 arab, a third consecutive heavy session. Rs 12.03 arab traded across three sessions while the index fell 29.29 points. That is distribution, and it is now confirmed.

• Reconstruction after the Rasuwa flood is estimated at nearly $4 billion roughly NPR 560 billion against Rs 180 billion of hydro damage and Rs 25.87 billion of insurance claims filed.

Two sessions ago this report flagged Rs 4.20 arab on a down day as distribution and said a second high-turnover decline would confirm institutional selling into the reform headline. Today delivered it.

NEPSE closed 2,531.55, down 13.85 points (−0.54%) on Rs 4.00 arab turnover, 1.06 crore units and 44,198 transactions across 341 scrips. Advancers 67, decliners 200, unchanged 15 an A/D ratio of 0.34, down from 0.39.

Support at 2,542.77 broke. That was yesterday's stated line, the level separating "spike inside a base" from "top of a failed bounce." The market gave it up and closed 11.22 points below it. All of Monday's reform gain and more is gone: from 2,560.84 the index has lost 29.29 points (−1.14%) in two sessions, and it now sits 9.00 points above 2,522.66 with the 2,513.42 coverage low 18.13 points below that.

Every captured sub-index closed red for a second consecutive session. Manufacturing was worst at −1.14% dragged by RSML −2.77%, SAIL −2.73%, GCIL −2.34% and SONA −2.03%. Life Insurance was least bad at −0.17%.

The large-cap trade ended. Sensitive fell 0.53% against NEPSE's 0.54% essentially in line. The sequence across three sessions was +0.99% vs +0.71%, then −0.35% vs −0.60%, now −0.53% vs −0.54%. The quality rotation that survived Wednesday's selloff has converged back to the market. Banking closed −0.47%, no longer defensive.

Then there is LEC. It closed limit-up at +15.00% on 19.27 lakh shares and Rs 45.49 crore of turnover, the largest single-stock turnover figure recorded in this coverage and 11.4% of the whole market's Rs 4.00 arab. It topped the volume table and the turnover table simultaneously. Critically, LEC does not appear anywhere in the block tape which means that Rs 45.49 crore came from ordinary-sized orders, not negotiated placements. This is broad, aggressive, retail-scale buying concentrated into one name on a day when two-thirds of the board fell.

The block tape tells the opposite story. SBI printed three identical Rs 4.01 crore blocks of 100,000 units each Rs 12.03 crore in one name, in tranches, at a price that barely moved (+0.47%). This report's standing rules already name SBI as an instrument that "printed four identical Rs 4.03 crore blocks" in an earlier session. The pattern has returned and it is the signature of a holder distributing size by arrangement.

Average deal size rose to Rs 90,576, the highest since early August. Rising ticket size on falling prices with near-record turnover is the cleanest distribution signature available in this dataset.

Index Snapshot

Turnover Rs 4.00 arab
Volume 1.06 crore units
Transactions 44,198
Scrips traded 341

The spread between the four indices has collapsed to nine basis points. On Monday it was 29 basis points with large caps leading; today everything fell together. Uniform decline across cap tiers means indiscriminate selling rather than positioning, nobody is defending anything.

Sectoral Indices Performance

Twelve captured, all red the second consecutive fully negative board. Float (173.82, −0.47%) is a broad index, not a sub-index.

The distribution is narrow. Ten of twelve sectors fell between 0.17% and 0.78% a tight band. Only Manufacturing broke out of it, and that is RSML's streak ending plus a broad give-back in SAIL, GCIL, SONA and PCIL after Monday's rally.

Development Bank improved to −0.34% from −2.37%, despite SINDU's third consecutive limit-down. Yesterday's sector-level breakdown did not extend, which removes one bearish thread, the damage there looks contained to specific names rather than the sector.

Hydropower at −0.55% again conceals everything. Eight of the ten top gainers are hydro, including a limit-up; five of the ten top losers are hydro. Third consecutive session where the hydro print carries no information.

Market Breadth

Running A/D series (7 Aug → 10 Sep): 0.32 → 0.51 → 0.99 → 0.70 → 1.66 → 0.67 → 0.35 → 0.32 → 0.79 → 1.01 → 0.36 → 0.21 → 0.42 → 0.09 → 1.24 → 0.08 → 2.15 → 2.57 → 1.18 → 2.47 → 0.39 → 0.34

Two consecutive readings in the 0.3s. For perspective, the late-August capitulation printed 0.09 and 0.08, today is bad but nowhere near that. What is notable is 200 decliners, the second-highest count of the coverage against 195 advancers on Monday. The market has swung from a record-high advancer count to a near-record decliner count in three sessions.

Technical scan

The Live Indicator Scan at 2:58 PM read 3,237 total signals: 735 bullish (22.71%) and 1,238 bearish (38.25%).

Running bullish %: 24.86 → 25.24 → 24.92 → 25.45 → 22.27 → 22.66 → 21.41 → 20.27 → 19.71 → 20.09 → 18.98 → 19.62 → 21.44 → 23.70 → 23.71 → 22.71

The scan rolled over, the first decline in four sessions. Bullish fell a full point from 23.71% to 22.71% bearish rose from 36.70% to 38.25%.

This resolves yesterday's divergence and it resolves against the call. Wednesday's note said the scan holding flat at 23.71% while breadth collapsed to 0.39 was a reason not to extrapolate the decline, on the basis that the scan had led correctly in four of five prior divergences. The market fell another 13.85 points and the scan followed it down. The scan lagged rather than led. Its record on divergences is now 4-for-6.

That is two failures in nine sessions for what this report has repeatedly called its most reliable leading indicator. The honest conclusion is that the scan works in trending conditions and fails at turning points which is exactly when a leading indicator is supposed to earn its keep. It stays in the report as context; it should not lead a call again until it strings together a run of correct divergences.

Winners & Losers

Top Gainers

LEC is the only gainer of the coverage to top both activity tables at limit-up. Rs 45.49 crore, 19.27 lakh shares, no block. Its recent path was unremarkable, +2.38% on 7 September, −0.47% on 9 September which makes today a discrete event rather than a continuation. Three other gainers (GHL, SSHL, HDHPC) also appear in the volume table so unlike most rally days the buying here is at least partly volume-backed.

ENL and JFL both bounced out of consecutive limit-downs, ENL +5.46% after two, JFL +4.28% after two. CFCL rose 4.46% after three straight declines. These are oversold reversals, not new trends.

ULHC is now the most erratic name on the board. Across four sessions: 300.00 → limit-down 260.00 → limit-up 299.00 → 320.00 (+7.02%). That is +23.1% in two sessions following a 13.33% collapse, in a stock that appears in no activity table.

Top Losers

SINDU is limit-down for a third consecutive session. From 585.50 before the run began to 359.70, that is −38.6% in three sessions. It is the only name in the coverage to have held a directional move three days other than RSML and it is the mirror image: RSML rose three days on blocks, SINDU has fallen three days at the circuit.

Yesterday's gainers are today's losers again, for the fourth consecutive session. SPL +6.40% → −5.19%. BHPL +5.79% → −4.40%. MANDU +3.40% → −4.14%. Three of Wednesday's top ten gainers are in today's top ten losers. The one-session churn pattern is now unbroken across four sessions and is the single most reliable feature of this market.

Turnover & Volume Leaders

Most Active by Turnover

Most Active by Volume

LEC (246.10, +15.00%, 19.27 L)
SBI (403.90, +0.47%, 4.19 L)
RIDI (346.80, −0.32%, 3.28 L)
RHPL (167.00, +2.45%, 2.37 L)
GBIME (248.60, −0.72%, 2.21 L)
GHL (235.90, +3.46%, 1.92 L)
SSHL (200.40, +4.92%, 1.85 L)
GBBL (440.60, −0.77%, 1.83 L)
API (326.00, −0.46%, 1.69 L)
HDHPC (205.00, +4.06%)

LEC's 19.27 lakh shares is 4.6 times the second-most-traded name. Its Rs 45.49 crore is 2.2 times RSML's.

The top four turnover names account for Rs 102.53 crore, 25.6% of the entire market. In a market with 341 scrips trading, one quarter of all money went into four names. This is the concentration problem SEBON described this week when it disclosed that only 17 lakh of 80 lakh demat accounts are active.

RSML held second place by turnover while falling 2.77% heavy volume, negative direction, and no block. That combination is the streak ending, not pausing.

Block tape

Bulk transaction panel timestamped 2:59 PM — a pre-close snapshot. The 3:00 PM terminal reading is the close.

Top 5 by amount: SBI Rs 4.01 Cr (26.30%), SBI Rs 4.01 Cr (26.30%), SBI Rs 4.01 Cr (26.30%), SHL Rs 1.61 Cr (10.58%), RHPL Rs 1.61 Cr (10.53%). Combined Rs 15.25 crore.

Top 5 by quantity: GIBF1 1,18,415, SBI 1,00,000, SBI 1,00,000, SBI 1,00,000, RHPL 97,890.

Three identical Rs 4.01 crore blocks, 100,000 units each, at roughly Rs 401 per share. SBI closed at 403.90, +0.47% 300,000 shares changed hands in arranged tranches with almost no price impact.

This is a named recurring pattern. This report's standing rules list SBI among instruments that print "four identical Rs 4.03 crore blocks" in a single session. It has now done the same thing again at Rs 4.01 crore. Identical tranche sizing is the fingerprint of a single seller working a pre-agreed disposal through the block window and the flat price confirms it was arranged rather than competed for.

RSML produced no block for the first time in four sessions and its price fell 2.77%. Running largest-block series:

ADBLB87 Rs 10.15 Cr → RSML Rs 5.44 Cr → SBI Rs 4.03 Cr → TAMOR Rs 95.30 L → SOHL Rs 76.06 L → SAHAS Rs 4.95 Cr → RSML Rs 8.10 Cr → RSML Rs 5.87 Cr → RSML Rs 5.88 Cr → SBI Rs 4.01 Cr

Average deal size Rs 90,576 is the highest since 21 August. Series: 53,605 → 59,442 → 74,087 → 85,606 → 75,399 → 83,375 → 90,576. Ticket size rising while the index falls and turnover stays near record is the textbook profile of larger holders selling to smaller ones.

Turnover integrity check: the three SBI blocks total Rs 12.03 crore, or 3.0% of Rs 4.00 arab. Stripping them leaves roughly Rs 3.88 arab of equity turnover still the third-highest of the coverage. Headline turnover stands but note that the single largest contributor to turnover today (LEC, Rs 45.49 Cr) is eleven times larger than the entire SBI block programme. The concentration risk in this tape is in the open market not the block window.

Mutual fund units (GIBF1, 118,415) again head the quantity list. Use turnover, not volume as the participation measure.

Previous Session Recap

Wednesday, 9 September, NEPSE fell 15.43 points to 2,545.40, giving back 85% of Monday's reform rally and losing 2,550 on its first test as support. Breadth collapsed to 0.39 and all thirteen sub-indices closed red. Turnover was Rs 4.20 arab, the second-highest of the coverage on 50,804 transactions. RSML rose 1.80% for a third consecutive gain with the largest block for a third consecutive session. ENL, JFL and SINDU were all limit-down for a second time. Insurers were reported to have paid Rs 7.62 billion of Rs 23.53 billion in Gen-Z movement claims, and SEBON disclosed that only 17 lakh of 80 lakh demat accounts are active.

Coverage index series (7 Aug → 10 Sep, 23 sessions): 2,650.08 → 2,641.06 → 2,641.85 → 2,642.40 → 2,651.21 → 2,643.83 → 2,641.82 → 2,622.48 → 2,622.22 → 2,629.40 → 2,618.72 → 2,599.58 → 2,594.27 → 2,558.35 → 2,557.31 → 2,513.42 → 2,522.66 → 2,538.11 → 2,542.77 → 2,560.84 → 2,545.40 → 2,531.55

Net across the coverage: −118.53 points, −4.47%. The recovery off the 31 August low has shrunk to +18.13 points (+0.72%), down from a peak of +47.42.

Signal Scorecard: what resolved today

Top Stories in Nepal

1. Emerging Nepal: seven shareholders, 913,099 shares and the price moved first

A seventh major shareholder of Emerging Nepal Limited (ENL) has filed to sell. Nanda Kishor Mundada notified the company of intent to sell 55,560 promoter shares within three months. Six others filed the previous day covering more than 8.5 lakh shares.

Why it matters and this is the important part. This report has tracked the August SEBON reform requiring 5%-plus shareholders to notify fifteen days before selling, disclosed via NEPSE since it took effect. The stated question was whether pre-disclosure dampens price impact or front-loads it. UHEWA, the first test on 1 September, dampened: the stock closed +0.17% the session after its filing.

ENL is the opposite result and worse than front-loading. The stock closed limit-down at −14.99% on 7 September, two sessions before the six-shareholder disclosure was published on 9 September then limit-down again on the 9th, a cumulative −27.7%. Today, with a seventh filing added, it rose 5.46%.

The sequence is: price collapses, disclosure publishes, price collapses again, further disclosure publishes, price rises. Whatever the mechanism, the first and largest move preceded the public filing. That is a governance observation rather than an accusation, and it is exactly the kind of thing SEBON's own IT audit and surveillance workstream exists to examine. The rule is producing disclosure; it is not yet producing orderly price discovery.

The forward overhang is real: 913,099 shares to be sold over three months in a name that has already fallen 27.7% and bounced 5.46%. Today's rally is into known supply.

2. Rasuwa reconstruction: nearly $4 billion

Reconstruction after the Rasuwa flood is estimated at nearly $4 billion roughly NPR 560 billion at prevailing rates.

Set that beside the numbers this report has been carrying:

Reconstruction cost is roughly 3.1 times the hydro damage estimate and 21.6 times the insurance claims filed. The reason is scope: the Rs 180 billion figure covers generation assets while reconstruction includes roads, transmission, the Rasuwagadhi corridor, settlements and public infrastructure. Recall that roughly 40 km of the 56 km Bidur–Rasuwagadhi road is destroyed and the 220 kV Trishuli-3 'B' hub substation is offline.

Why it matters: NPR 560 billion is not an insurance problem or a corporate-earnings problem. It is a fiscal problem. It arrives at a moment when Rasuwa Customs revenue around NPR 13.64 billion last fiscal year is impaired, NRB is withdrawing Rs 85 billion from BFIs, NEA has reported a 43% profit decline and Rs 166.50 billion sits in margin lending against share collateral. A reconstruction programme of that scale is either financed by government borrowing which competes with private credit or by concessional external funding which takes time. Neither outcome is priced into a market that spent Monday rallying on a reform speech.

3. Gold crosses Rs 305,000 per tola

Gold rose Rs 3,400 per tola to cross the Rs 305,000 mark.

Why it matters: for a retail investor base of roughly 1.7 million active demat accounts, gold is the direct competitor for savings. The index is down 4.47% over the coverage while gold has been climbing. In an environment of flood disruption, festival-quarter inflation with LPG selling 38.6% above the official price, and a market that has failed fifteen rotations in twenty-three sessions, the relative-return argument for equities is thin. Watch whether NEPSE turnover holds above Rs 3 arab as gold continues to rise sustained bullion strength alongside falling equity turnover would be a genuine allocation shift rather than a trading pause.

4. Corporate flow: bonus listing, capital deployment, IPO pipeline

United Modi Hydropower (UMHL) bonus shares were listed on NEPSE, new tradeable supply arriving in a hydro sector that has failed to hold a direction all coverage.

Hathway Investment Nepal (HATHY) will invest up to Rs 40 crore in a sugar mill and a hydropower project. The stock closed +0.33%. Note the pattern: this is a listed investment company deploying capital into real assets during a flood-disrupted period and the market barely registered it. Earnings and capital-allocation news remain 0 for 6 in this coverage.

SEBON's IPO pipeline grew again: the Saurya Krishi Company proposal was added along with share issues from two investment companies. Combined with Beni Hydropower's 15.80× oversubscription and 1.16 million applicants, the primary market continues to absorb demand that the secondary market cannot generate.

Kalinchowk Darshan (KDL) set its book closure for the 8.9474% dividend and called its AGM for Ashwin 16, the same date as GBIME's. WorldLink launched Biz24, a managed Wi-Fi service for SMEs.

5. Politics and the cabinet

PM Balendra Shah called a ministerial meeting at Singhadurbar and the cabinet approved his UN General Assembly visit. Dipak Kumar Sah has been recommended as the new Industry Minister.

Why it matters: Monday's index move came from a Finance Ministry directive on capital market reform, with proposals still to be drafted. A cabinet in transition, with a new industry minister and the prime minister travelling is a cabinet unlikely to move legislation quickly. The reform trade required follow-through; the political calendar argues against it arriving soon.

Corporate Actions & Events

What to Watch

1. 2,522.66 is 9.00 points below; 2,513.42 is 18.13. Two supports have already failed this week. A break of 2,513.42 puts the market into untested territory with 2,500 the only visible reference. Conversely, holding 2,522.66 keeps the 1–3 September consolidation intact and makes this a retest rather than a breakdown.

2. Does LEC follow through? Rs 45.49 crore and 11.4% of the tape at limit-up, with no block behind it. Fifteen of sixteen rotations have failed on day three; this one has to survive day two first. A second limit-up on comparable turnover would be the largest single-name event of the coverage. A reversal makes today's Rs 45 crore the most expensive one-day trade in the dataset.

3. A fourth SBI tranche. Three identical Rs 4.01 crore blocks with the price up 0.47% is a seller working an arrangement. The prior instance of this pattern ran to four blocks. Watch for another Rs 4.01 crore print and for whether SBI's price holds once the programme finishes arranged selling usually caps a stock until it clears.

4. Average deal size against price direction. Rs 90,576 and rising while the index falls is distribution. The signal flips only if ticket size stays high and the index turns up. If deal size keeps climbing on down days, larger holders are still selling and the retail bid is absorbing it.

5. ENL's 913,099-share overhang. The stock bounced 5.46% today into three months of announced supply from seven holders. Also watch whether any further ENL filings appear — the count has gone from six to seven in two days. And watch whether the next SEBON pre-disclosure elsewhere moves the price before or after publication; ENL and UHEWA gave opposite answers, and a third data point decides which is the pattern.

6. SINDU on day four. Three consecutive limit-downs, −38.6%. Either supply exhausts or this becomes the sharpest single-name collapse of the coverage. It is also the only three-day directional hold left standing now that RSML's has ended.

7. The $4 billion reconstruction number entering polcy. Watch for a financing plan, a supplementary budget line, or external commitments. NPR 560 billion against impaired customs revenue and Rs 85 billion of NRB liquidity withdrawal is a crowding-out risk for private credit, and it is the largest unpriced macro factor in this market. Still no NRB circular on flood-affected loan classification.

8. Gold versus turnover. Rs 305,000 per tola and climbing, against an index down 4.47% over the coverage. Sustained bullion strength alongside equity turnover falling back below Rs 3 arab would mark an allocation shift rather than a trading pause.