Dhaka, Bangladesh (BBN) – Bangladesh’s stocks closed marginally lower for the two consecutive weeks that ended on Thursday as investors booked quick-profit ahead of Eid festival.
The week witnessed five trading sessions as usual. The first three sessions closed lower, while last two closed positive.
The benchmark index of the Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE) went down by 5.23 points or 0.11 percent to finish the week at 4,549.04 points over the previous week.
The two other indices also ended in the red. The DS30 index, comprising blue chips, fell 3.55 points or 0.20 percent to settle at 1,744.62 points.
The DSE Shariah Index lost 4.02 points or 0.36 percent to close at 1,103.33 points.
The port city bourse, Chittagong Stock Exchange (CSE) also finished lower with its Selective Categories Index, CSCX, falling 18.79 points or 0.22 percent to close at 8,502.49 points.
“Though indicate selling spree of the investors, the upward swing of the market in the last two trading sessions may be an indication of change in investors’ behaviour,” said LankaBangla Securities, a stockbroker, in its weekly analysis.

The stockbroker noted that both small and large cap stocks were present in the list of the turnover leaders, however, the list of top gainers were dominated by general insurance companies.
The total turnover on the DSE stood at BDT 22.24 billion, which was Tk 11 percent higher than the previous week’s BDT 20.03 billion as last week saw five trading sessions against previous week’s four.
The daily turnover averaged BDT 4.45 billion, registering a decline of 11.20 percent over the previous week’s average of BDT 5.0 billion.
IDLC Investments, a merchant bank, said, “Over the ups and downs, investors tried to generate some short-term trades and in-between booked some profit in large and micro cap stocks”.
The merchant bank noted that the market offered some buying opportunities to the investors after the loss of 72 points in last few days’ down trend. Investors tried to utilize the opportunity and exerted buying pressure later part of the week.
“The investors tried to grab the opportunities of declining trend and created some buying pressure on short-term trading motive. Consequently, the broad index recovered at the later part of the week,” said the merchant bank.
The losers took a marginal lead over the gainers as out of 326 issues traded, 148 closed lower, 144 closed higher and 34 remained unchanged on the DSE trading floor last the week.
Shahjibazar Power Company dominated the week’s turnover chart with shares worth BDT 1.02 billion changing hands, followed by MJL Bangladesh, National Tubes, Beximco Pharma and Square Pharma.

Continental Insurance was the week’s best performer, posting a gain of 37.69 percent, while National Tubes was the worst loser, slumping by 15.97 percent.

BBN/SSR/BB