Dhaka, Bangladesh (BBN) - The BBN (Bangladesh Business News) has prepared the morning business round up compiling reports, published by different newspapers and news portals in Bangladesh.
Exports on course to record
Exports are homing in on the target of $33.5 billion for this fiscal year after May's receipts took the tally to a touching distance. Bangladesh received $3.03 billion from exports in May, up 6.69 percent year-on-year, according to data from the Export Promotion Bureau. May's exports take earnings in the first 11 months of fiscal 2015-16 to $30.67 billion. The government has set a doable target of $2.83 billion for June. Full-year receipts of $33.5 billion would be a record for Bangladesh.
Foreign workers send $5b home each year
Due to shortage of skilled human resources, 200,000 foreigners, mostly Indians, hired as marketing and manufacturing managers and supervisors remit home a $5 billion out of their annual earnings in Bangladesh. Job market analysts blamed the absence of training facilities in Bangladesh as the principal reason that forces local employers to hire foreigners to fill in highly paid private sector work.
Revenue board introduces 'progressive' taxation for contractors' bills
Contractors receiving higher payments have to pay tax at source at higher rates on their bills as per rules proposed for the upcoming fiscal year. The National Board of Revenue (NBR) has proposed to raise the rate of tax at source on a contractor's bill above Tk 50 million in a bid to introduce progressive taxation in the highly potential sector of the direct tax collection.
Sharp fall in bank deposit growth
The country’s banking sector witnessed a sharp fall in deposit growth in March as banks were slashing their interest rates continuously almost every month during the last two years. The average deposit growth rate came down to 8.28% in March this year compared to 12.49% in the same month of the last year. The weighted average interest rate on deposit dropped to 5.77% as of April, this year, which was 7.04% in the same month of the last year, according to the central bank data.
Bangladesh’s stocks edge higher amid volatility
Bangladesh’s stocks ended marginally higher on Wednesday, after remaining flat in the past session, as optimistic investors went on buying on lucrative stocks. Both the Dhaka Stock Exchange, the prime bourse of Bangladesh, and Chittagong Stock Exchange, the port city bourse of the country, started with a upward trend and the positive trend sustain till end of the session amid marginal volatility.
Bangladesh cotton importers shift orders from India over price hike
Cotton exports from India, the world’s biggest producer, have nearly halted as local prices have rallied due to tight supplies because of drought, forcing key importers like Bangladesh, Pakistan and Vietnam to turn to other suppliers. The freeze in Indian export will prompt Brazil, Australia and United States to raise shipments and has pushed global prices to near their highest since August.
WB predicts decline in GDP growth next fiscal
The World Bank (WB), in its latest report, has predicted Bangladesh's economic growth in the upcoming fiscal at 6.3 per cent, 0.2 per cent less than the growth it has projected for the outgoing fiscal (1015-16), due to lesser harvests and slower credit growth. The WB growth forecast is 0.9 percentage points lower than the government projection of 7.2 per cent for the fiscal year 2016-17.
Trade gap drops to $5.27b in Jul-Apr
The country’s trade deficit decreased to $5.27 billion in the first 10 months of the current financial year 2015-16 compared with that of $5.87 billion in the same period of FY15 amid a fall in import payments against higher export earnings. The country had registered a trade gap of $5.50 billion in the first 10 months of FY14, according to Bangladesh Bank data.
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