Good morning. Here's what happened overnight and what you need to know today.
1.
GDP Growth Lowest in Five Quarters: Bangladesh recorded its lowest economic growth in the past five quarters in the last quarter of fiscal 2023-24 due to contractionary monetary and fiscal policies to tackle the dwindling forex reserves and high inflation. Between April and June this year, the GDP grew by 3.91 percent, according to the latest published quarterly data by the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS) yesterday. A year earlier, the country clocked in 6.88 percent GDP growth. (The Daily Star)
2.
Rice Import Stalls: It has been over a week since the government allowed private imports of rice with reduced tariffs to alleviate consumer discomfort from soaring local rice prices, yet traders have shown little interest in importing. The primary concern remains the import cost, which exceeds Tk65 per kg of rice. In response to the stagnant import activity, the Ministry of Food is set to request a further reduction of the import tariff to 5%. Officials plan to quickly submit a proposal letter to the National Board of Revenue (NBR) aimed at making tariffs more manageable and facilitating private imports. (The Business Standard)
3.
BB Probe into Union Bank: ‘S Alam Staffer’ Took Tk 118cr Sans Approval: A "staffer of S Alam Group" took out Tk 118 crore from Union Bank without any approval or following any banking norms, indicating how the controversial business conglomerate used the bank. During a recent inspection, Bangladesh Bank also discovered that money was withdrawn from the bank even after its board was reconstituted in August. The inspection team found the Chattogram-based business group and its associate companies took out Tk 17,229.10 crore from the bank through scams and irregularities, which is 67 percent of its total disbursed loans. (The Daily Star)
4.
Agriculture Loan Disbursements Drops 27% in Q1: Agriculture loan disbursements dropped by nearly 27 per cent in the first quarter (Q1) of the current fiscal year (FY 2024-25) mainly due to political unrest and severe flooding in different parts of the country, officials said. The disbursements came down to BDT 64.58 billion during the July-September quarter of FY '25 from BDT 88.25 billion in the same period of the previous fiscal year, according to the Bangladesh Bank’s (BB) latest statistics. Of the BDT 64.58 billion, eight public banks disbursed BDT 24.32 billion and the remaining BDT 40.26 billion by the private commercial banks (PCBs) and foreign commercial banks (FCBs). (Bangladesh Business News)
5.
Quarterly Apparel Export Dives 36% in Apr-Jun: Bangladesh's apparel export dipped 36.02 per cent to US$8.83 billion in the last quarter of the past fiscal year, compared to the turnover of previous three months. Latest data from Bangladesh Bank (BB) sowed the significant decline in the April-June quarter of FY2023-24. In the previous January-March quarter the earnings came to $11.77 billion. This figure is also 1.38-percent lower than that of the same quarter of the previous fiscal year, April-June FY2022-23, when earnings reached $8.96 billion, as reported by the central bank. (The Financial Express)
6.
Chattogram Suffers 40% YoY Investment Nosedive: Investment registration in Chattogram, often regarded as the commercial capital of Bangladesh, has seen a steep 40 per cent decline over the past year. Despite efforts by the previous Awami League government to initiate several mega projects in the region, a combination of inefficiencies hindered the expected growth in investments. Factors such as economic instability within the country, money laundering abroad, dwindling foreign reserves, and a lack of adequate logistical support have all contributed to the drop in investment registrations in the Chattogram region. (The Business Post)
----Saju Sarker
BBN/SSR/AD