Nepal Stock Exchange (NEPSE) index has increased by 17.42 points to close at 354.78 points on Thursday compared to 337.36 points on Sunday last week.

Though secondary stock market index had plunged to 336.30 points on Tuesday, all the days witnessed positive growth following the breakthrough in the peace process which has boosted investors' confident.

Over the week, NEPSE traded with 115 companies registering the turnover of Rs. 359.7 million through 6222 transactions while it had traded with 115 companies registering the turnover of Rs. 129.8 million through 4190 transactions the previous week.

Of the total transaction, Group A companies alone contributed Rs. 262.2 million which is 74.72 percent of the total turnover.

As per the sub-indices of all the groups, all the groups are in the positive growth - commercial bank by 19.55 points, manufacturing by 6.33 points, other by 29.39 points, hydropower by 8.79 points, insurance by 25.36 points, finance by 4.32 points and development bank by 8.81 points.

However, hotel and trading group remained unchanged at 437.31 points and 202.02 points, respectively.

Bank of Kathmandu (Rs. 86.74 million), Everest Bank (Rs. 31.21 million), Nepal Investment Bank (Rs. 18.33 million), Chilime Hydropower Company Limited (Rs. 17.08 million), and Laxmi Bank (Rs. 16.61 million) were the top five companies to register the highest transaction last week. nepalnews.com