Dhaka stocks nosedive last week
November 30, 2008
Dhaka stocks suffered a sharp fall in the last volatile week as investors, shaken by the downtrend in the market for the last couple of months, continued selling off their holdings, market analysts said. The general index of Dhaka Stock Exchange lost 156.44 points, or 5.98 per cent, to close at 2,459.48, the lowest since August 29 last year when it was 2455.09, while its blue chips index, DSE20, shed 92.53 points, or 4.22 per cent, to finish at 2,100.91. ‘The market remained sluggish as financial institutions were holding back investments before the yearend,’ said Abu Ahmed, a professor of economics at Dhaka University and a stock market analyst.
He said small investors rushed to offload shares as their confidence level declined due to the downtrend in the market. He, however, suggested that investors should buy now as prices of the most of the securities came down to rational level.
The benchmark DSE general index lost 507.34 points, or 17.10 per cent since September 25 when it was 2966.82.
On last Thursday, a day after the World Bank forecasted the country’s gloomy economic growth, the benchmark index lost 100.38 points, the worst single-day fall in four years.
‘The lending agency’s forecast gave a negative signal to the investors, who were already unnerved by the downtrend in the market,’ said Salahuddin Ahmed Khan, chief executive officer of the bourse.
The country’s economic growth may dip to 4.8 per cent from the officially projected 6.5 per cent this fiscal year due to possible decline in exports and remittances in the fallout of the current global recession, the WB said on Wednesday.
Finance adviser Mirza Azizul Islam, however, ruled out such a gloomy forecast and expressed his confidence that the economic growth in no way would come down below 6 per cent.
The market, however, on last Sunday soared with the DSE general index posting a 100.88 points rise due to a buying spree of investors enthused by the positive political developments.
Losers outnumbered the gainers last week. Out of 293 issues, 18 advanced, 237 declined, two remained unchanged, and 36 were not traded in the week.
M Habibur Rahman, a retail investor, said a rise in margin-loan ratio from 1:1 to 1:1.5 for merchant banks by the Securities and Exchange Commission from November 18 failed to stimulate the market as big individual investors and institutional investors remained almost inactive, keeping up a ‘wait-and-see’ policy.
The DSE daily average turnover, however, registered a 19.57-per cent rise to Tk 225 crore from the previous week’s Tk 188 crore. Total turnover at the bourse in the week was Tk 1,125 crore.
DSE market capitalisation fell to Tk 94,796 crore on Thursday from Tk 95,910 crore of the previous week’s closing.
Uttara Bank topped the turnover leaders with a total transaction of Tk 109 crore which accounted for 9.64 per cent of the week’s total market turnover at the main bourse.
Beximco Pharmaceuticals, Titas Gas, Beximco, National Bank, AB Bank, BRAC Bank, Square Pharmaceuticals, ACI, and Shinepukur Ceramics were the rest of the week’s top 10 turnover leaders.
Zeal Bangla Sugar was the biggest gainer with 25.50 per cent rise in its share price, while National Tubes was the worst loser with 43.68 per cent fall.
Of the total turnover in the week, ‘A’ category issues accounted for 83.37 per cent, while ‘B’ category issues shared 0.71 per cent, ‘N’ category 13.34 per cent, and ‘Z’ category 2.58 per cent.
Source: New Age
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