Dhaka, Aug. 20 -- After four consecutive sessions of gains, the country's stock markets witnessed a downturn on Wednesday as key indices, share prices of most companies and overall turnover declined both in Dhaka and Chattogram.

The Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE) opened higher but the momentum could not sustain as indices fell gradually throughout the session.

At the end of the day's trade, the benchmark DSEX index shed 31 points.

Among other indices, the Shariah-based DSES lost 11 points while the blue-chip DS30 dropped 18 points.

Out of the 398 issues traded, prices fell for 223, advanced for 124 and remained unchanged for 51.

In category-wise performance, most issues declined across A, B and Z categories.

In the A-category, which com...