Ahsan Habib

Despite being hit by the fallout of the coronavirus, Bangladesh’s corporate giants are not sitting idle as they have joined the government’s efforts by enhancing supplies to the ill-equipped health sector and extending helping hand to the low-income people who are facing existential crisis because of the lockdown.

Globally, stock market investors are looking to cash out their shares. It’s the same here in Bangladesh -- except they are not finding any takers.

Junk and some over-valued stocks were the real winners of the capital market regulator’s move on Thursday to set a new floor price to thwart a meltdown in the bourse amid the heightened coronavirus fears.

There is a Spanish proverb that goes along the lines of pouring water on a drowned mouse, which means putting in more resources into a losing battle.

BD Paints, a relatively new entrant to the Bangladesh’s paint landscape, plans to raise Tk 20 crore from the capital market in order to ramp up its production capacity -- even though about 60 per cent of its existing capacity remains unutilised.

Farhana Hakim, once an employee of a private company, embarked on her journey as an exporter of non-traditional items like baskets and showpieces banking on mere seagrasses (locally known as hogla) and date palm leaves.

Walton Hi-Tech Industries is flying high, so it is reasonable to assume there would be a clamour for a slice of the home grown electronics giant.

The high price and a lack of awareness are the main reasons why as many as 80 per cent of the menstruating females in Bangladesh do not use sanitary napkins, leaving them susceptible to a myriad of health problems.

Advent Pharma illegally appointed Ahmed Zaker and Co to audit the company’s financial report, the Financial Reporting Council (FRC) found in an investigation.

Local electronics giant Walton is, arguably, going through a purple patch.

The news of offloading of shares by a key sponsor of Ring Shine Textile yesterday, within just two and a half months after its listing on the Dhaka and Chattogram bourses, is yet another blow to the general investors, who have seeing the value of their holdings plummet by the day.

All over the globe stocks have been on slide in recent days as economic costs of the coronavirus pandemic have started to spook investors. The situation is no different in Bangladesh.

Robi plans to submit its application for listing in the country’s twin bourses to the Bangladesh Securities and Exchange Commission in the middle of next month, as the long-awaited debut of the second largest mobile phone operator is finally taking shape.

All but one of the listed rod makers’ profits dropped in the first half of the current financial year on the back of lower sales volume and higher deferred tax expense.

Foreign stock investor are retreating from Bangladesh’s capital market as the bear run in the bourse is chipping away their portfolio value.

Boosting stocks by providing an incentive of making loans available is not a sustainable way for reviving investors’ confidence, rather, it might lead to the creation of further risks for the banking sector, said experts on the matter.

In a strange turn of event, Pinaki & Company, one of the oldest auditor in Bangladesh, sent out a denial that it had audited the balance sheet of Meera Agro Inputs attached with the draft prospectus to raise Tk 5 crore from the small capital board of the Dhaka Stock Exchange.

Some 8 per cent of state-owned ICB Asset Management Company’s funds are tied in stocks that have shuttered production or have not been providing dividend for many years now, in what can be viewed as an emblem of the slapdash nature of the country’s bourse.

The Dhaka Stock Exchange’s market capitalisation is now a respectable Tk 342,570 crore, so one would think a raft of stock market data analysis providers would have set up shop in the last few years.

Parachute Coconut Oil: one product by which Indian fast-moving consumer goods brand is almost synonymous with.