Suspend transaction till normalcy returns, investors demand

Investors shout slogans on the Motijheel streets in the capital on Wednesday as the premier bourse suffered a 151-point slump. Photo: STARStar Online ReporInvestors on Thursday demanded suspension of transaction until normalcy returns to the country’s two bourses as they submitted a memorandum on 15-point demand to stockmarket regulator Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
A 14-member delegation of investors under the banner of ‘Bangladesh Share Investors’ Association’ (BSIA) submitted the memo to SEC Chairman Dr M Khairul Hossain.
Meanwhile, another group of investors under the banner of ‘ICB Investors Forum’ submitted another memo to the SEC on 16-point demand which includes restructuring the SEC, Dhaka and Chittagong stock exchanges.
The investors’ move came in the backdrop of declining share prices despite a government move to change some top SEC officials.
A BSIA delegation led by its convenor, AKM Mizan-ur-Rashid Chowdhury, met the SEC chief in the noon and placed their 15-point memo to rein in the slumping share prices.
During their one-hour meeting, the investors demanded that the regulator reduces the SLR (Statutory Liquidity Ratio) and CRR (Cash Reserve Ratio) rate, takes action and against share manipulators and forces them to reinvest in the market, and forces financial institutions which made profit from stockmarket in 2010 to reinvest in the market.
The other BSIA demands include making margin loan ratio 1:2 (which means an investor will receive Tk 200 in loan against his investment of Tk 100) and allowing whitening of black money by investing in the stockmarket.
A four-member delegation of ICB Investors Forum (IIF) later placed its memo on 16 demands which include stockmarket demutualisation (demutualisation of a stock exchange transforms it from an entity owned by mostly brokerage-owning members into a for-profit company owned by shareholders).
The IIF also demanded raising the capital of the ‘Bangladesh Fund’ to Tk 20,000 crore from Tk 5,000 crore, making margin loan ratio 1:2, not to impose any tax on beneficiary owners' account holders, and to make tax identification numbers mandatory for BO account holders in the next fiscal year.