Ahsan Habib

The plan to offload an additional 15.2 per cent shares of state-run Rupali Bank has been revived after a delay caused by the coronavirus pandemic and the lender’s preoccupation in disbursing stimulus packages.

The Dhaka Stock Exchange is coming to the rescue of stockbrokers as the premier bourse is set to increase their share buying capacity without the need to keep security deposits.

Investors suffered yesterday as they were unable to access information on time as the website of the Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE) was slow to load.

The stock market regulator has asked all listed companies to inform it whether they are lending to their associated and sister companies at the expense of general investors, in another bold step from the new top brass.

Listed banks increased their investment in government and corporate bonds, securities and stocks in the second quarter of 2020 to offset the loss in interest income caused by the ceiling on lending rates.

AB Bank has put the factory of Aman Feed and its collateral on sale for its failure to pay Tk 268.40 crore in loans and interest within the sanctioned timeframe of July.

ACI Motors is set to secure an equity-based foreign investment of Tk 126 crore from two companies as it landed its first foreign investment.

The stock market has started to bounce back despite the ongoing pandemic thanks mainly to investors’ growing confidence in the new leadership at the Bangladesh Securities and Exchange Commission (BSEC) as they took some measures to restore discipline.

Listed firms have called upon the regulators to introduce guidelines on how to set the share value that the companies have to issue against share money deposit.

Anomalies in preparing financial reports of listed companies are not rare in Bangladesh and the authorities have tracked down yet another case.

The new governing body of the stock market regulator, it seems, is earnest in its efforts to straighten out the bourse that has long been a playground for rogue players.

City Bank’s profit tumbled 42 per cent in the first half of 2020 due to the new interest rate regime and disruption in business caused by the pandemic.

The famed off-road motorcycles of KTM would soon be available in Bangladesh thanks to Runner Automobiles, which yesterday announced an agreement with Bajaj Auto that part-owns the Austrian bike brand to become its authorised distributor.

It will take no less than a year from hereon for normalcy to return to businesses that have been devastated in the past four months following the novel coronavirus outbreak, said SM Ashraful Alam, managing director of Walton Hi-tech Industries.

Keya Cosmetics becomes a textbook case of how a high-flying company falls from grace in fits and starts.

SS Steel, a newly listed company, plans to acquire Saleh Steel Industries with the view to staking a larger claim on the Tk 55,000 crore-industry, in yet another indication of the impending recovery of the Bangladesh economy from the fallout of the global coronavirus pandemic.

The expected happened. Banks’ profits were supposed to take a massive hit in the second quarter of 2020, and that took place.

Stock investors yesterday welcomed the expansionary monetary policy unveiled by the central bank, hoping it would rejuvenate the battered economy and persuade institutional investors to pour money into the capital market.

Footwear giant Bata Shoe has incurred losses for the first time in Bangladesh as it missed the country’s main shopping season after people’s income was wiped out by the coronavirus pandemic.

Reckitt Benckiser Bangladesh witnessed robust growth in sales and profits in the pandemic-ravaged first half of 2020 on the back of higher sales of hygiene products.