FE Report

Share trading at stock branches outside the capital witnessed a declining trend last week as investors at the local level adopted a wait-and-see policy over price correction, restriction on margin loans and delay in the High Court verdict on mutual funds, local investors said.

"Last week prices of many companies fell. Because, the local investors have chosen to watch the situation as the court has delayed its verdict on the writ petition concerning mutual funds. So the market is witnessing a sluggish trend for the time being," Alamgir Hossain, an investor based in Bogra told the FE on telephone Friday.

"The local investors are also keeping an eye on the overall market situation," said another investor Monir Ahmed from Comilla.

"The SEC (Securities and Exchange Commission) restriction on extending margin loans for purchasing shares of mutual funds also had an adverse impact on trading at the local level," Monir Ahmed added.

Local sources said the volumes of shares traded at Bogra, Feni and Barisal decreased by Tk. 12.176 million, Tk. 3.8 million and Tk 10.2 million respectively.

The volume of shares traded at Bogra Thursday stood at Tk. 34.15 million, down from Sunday's Tk. 46.326 million.

The total volume of shares traded at Feni fell to Tk. 38.9 million from Sunday's Tk. 42.7 million.

At Barisal it fell to Tk 56.8 million Thursday from Tk. 67 million of Sunday, the first trading day of the week.

At Narayanganj the volume reached Tk. 77.9 million Sunday and then fell to Tk. 67.1 million the next day.

The Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE) has so far approved 381 stock branches across the country. However, a complete district-wise list of DSE branches was not yet available. The premier bourse of the country has asked its members to submit their addresses for preparing a complete list to be published in the annual DSE diary, a source said.

However, according to local sources, the number of stock branches at Bogra is four, at Narayanganj five, at Barisal four, at Comilla five, at Khulna eight, at Feni three, at Jessore one, at Rajshahi four and at Mymensingh one.