Dhaka, Bangladesh (BBN) – Bangladesh’s stocks rebounded last week that ended on Thursday, breaking three weeks’ losing streak as last session of the week saw sharp gain following the securities regulators’ positive steps to revive the stock market.
The securities regulator -- Bangladesh Securities and Exchange Commission (BSEC) Wednesday allowed share netting facility for the same security and extended the deadline to provision un-realised losses of merchant banks and stock brokers.
The securities regulator also extended the suspension period of effectiveness of the section 3(5) of the margin rules till June 30, 2015, allowing transactions in the portfolios which declined below 150 per cent in value.
“The securities regulators’ positive steps might encourage the investors to take fresh position on last session of the week,” said a merchant banker.
The week featured four trading sessions like previous two weeks instead of five as market was closed Wednesday due to Bank Holiday. Of them, three sessions saw sharp gain while one session saw marginal loss.
Week-on-week, DSEX, the prime index of the Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE) crossed the 4,900-mark after three weeks and ended at 4,941.52 points, gaining 117.94 points or 2.45 percent.
The DS30, comprising blue chips index gained 56.30 points or 3.15 percent to close at 1,843.18 points. The DSE Shariah Index rose 35.32 points or 3.10 percent to close at 1,174.02 points.
The port city bourse Chittagong Stock Exchange (CSE) also ended higher after three weeks with its Selective Categories Index-CSCX – gained 146.39 points or 1.62 percent to close the week at 9,165.68 points.
However, market participation remained dry and total turnover for the week accumulated to BDT 8.39 billion against BDT 8.99 billion in the week before.
The daily turnover for the week averaged BDT 2.09 billion, registering a decline of 6.66 percent over the previous week’s average of BDT 2.24 billion.
LanlaBangla Securities said the market observed reversal in the last week of 2014 as most of the stocks generated positive return after observing sluggishness in consecutive weeks.
“In the year of 2015, investors might be eying for reaping benefits from falling commodity prices and interest rate,” said the stock broker.
IDLC Investments said: “The week remained volatile while nervous investors tried to set expectation in anticipation of better economic results in the New Year”.
Turnover remained weak throughout the week partly due to political uncertainty. The week observed two consecutive nationwide strikes which also played a role to set the investors’ mood, the merchant bank said.
All the major sectors gained last week. Cement appreciated sharply by 7.86 per cent - mainly from the sector’s heavy weight Lafarge Surma which gained 14.4 per cent alone.
Gainers outpaced losers as out of 299 issues traded, 231 advanced, 58 declined and 24 remained unchanged on the DSE trading floor.
Lafarge Surma Cement dominated the week’s top turnover chart for the second consecutive weeks with shares worth BDT 424.19 million changing hands followed by MJL BD, Beximco Pharma, GP and DESCO.
Al-Haj Textile was the week’s top gainer, posting a rise of 24.13 percent while Shahzibazar Power Company was the week’s worst loser, plunging by 16.86 percent.
BBN/SSR/AD-02Jan15-11:30 pm (BST)