Ahsan Habib

Pharmaceuticals turned out to be the most attractive sector in the stock market yesterday thanks to the continuation of the industry’s solid business amid the coronavirus pandemic.

The Bangladesh Securities and Exchange Commission (BSEC) is taking strict measures to maintain minimum shareholding among directors of listed companies in a bid to revive the country’s stock index.

Stock investors of CVO Petrochemical Refinery have been in a flap as the company has announced to close operations for at least three months due to a shortage of condensate, a gas by-product used as a key raw material by refineries.

The government is being deprived of hundreds of crores of taka every year in dividend income from listed state-run companies as no shares are issued against the government’s investment in those companies.

Most banks’ operating profits declined 20 to 30 per cent in the first half of 2020 because of the paralysed economy but the fall did not reflect properly in their stock prices owing to the floor price.

A decade ago, a verbal directive from the regulator to stop the practice of forced-sale hit the stock market hard and the impacts are still being felt these days.

Bank Asia is set to form a neobank, a thoroughly novel concept for Bangladesh, within December, in a move that can change the face of banking in the country.

At a time when most companies are grappling with the economic fallout of the global coronavirus pandemic, local giant Beximco Group, it seems, is doing rather well for itself.

Fourteen banks have together formed a Tk 1,650 crore fund to invest in the stock market but they are now waiting for the lifting of the floor price that the market watchdog set for all stocks earlier.

Small capital-based Sonali Paper & Board Mill’s re-listing on the mainboard of the Dhaka Stock Exchange has raised questions as the regulator granted an exemption to it to pave the way for the resumption of its trading.

Robi is set to come up with the country’s biggest-ever initial public offering yet within a couple of months, in what can be viewed as finally some good news for the depressed bourse.

Liquidity management in the banking sector will become a challenging task in the near future due to the coronavirus fallout, said Mominul Islam, managing director of IPDC Finance.

Stockbrokers have urged the government to reduce the advance income tax on the volume of trade as most of them are incurring losses amid the bearish trend in the market.

Global stock markets saw almost a V-shaped recovery during the coronavirus pandemic. But Bangladesh’s stock market is an exception.

Krishibid Feed, a sister concern of Krishibid Group, has deisgns to go public to raise Tk 30 crore to expand its business to meet the growing demand for feeds in the livestock sector.

When the country’s financial sector was facing the mounting challenge of liquidity pressure last year, LankaBangla Finance logged handsome growth in its profit.

One would think that the ability to conduct stock trading online would take off like a rocket, given the immense convenience the facility offers. But, the initiative, which was launched four years ago, failed to capture the imagination of retail investors.

The country’s twin bourses yesterday withdrew the floor price from the block market allowing big investors to trade shares at rates lower than the existing ones in the main market.

Walton Hi-tech Industries usually offers several types of discounts on its products round the year. But this time, the high-flying company has come up with a discount on its share price, in a move not seen by the country’s bourse before.

The proposed budget has brought no cheers for stock investors, who have been battered by a prolonged slump in indices, but promised measures to develop the country’s bond market.