Dhaka stocks continued to fall for the seventh consecutive session Tuesday with the benchmark DGEN sinking to nearly 10-month low.
Trading at the Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE), however, opened with downbeat mood but it quickly rose by 24 points within next 30 minutes in the first hour of the trade. Later, the benchmark DSE General Index nosedived towards the close of the trade.
Being frustrated over the continuous erosion in share prices, a group of investors staged demonstration in front of the DSE building at around 11 am, blaming the securities regulator and prime bourse for the persistent fall of the market and protesting the approval of mutual fund rules by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
A contingent of the law enforcing agencies rushed to the spot and brought the situation under control within half an hour without any untoward incident, according to eye witnesses.
Meanwhile, the DSE authorities smelt a rat behind the downtrend of the market and alleged that a group of investors took to the street when the market was rising.
The DSE suspicion made known at a press briefing called hurriedly Tuesday just after the demonstration.
"Unlike other demonstration organised in the recent past, the investors took to the street this time when the market was going up, indicating something fishy," said DSE senior vice president Saiful Islam.
In another development, the SEC will sit tomorrow (Thursday) with the bourses and the merchant banks to review the latest market situation.
The DSE senior vice president Saiful Islam added that there was no justifiable ground to stage the demonstration as the market was positive at that time. "Somebody has instigated them to make the situation murky," he alleged.
Echoing him, chief executive officer (CEO) of the DSE Salahuddin Ahmed Khan said, "I am really confused. Why should there be demonstration when the market is up."
President of the DSE Abdul Haque was present at the press briefing.
On the current market situation, Saiful said, "Investors should not go for panic selling being guided by rumours, the investors should wait at this stage as data of unaudited half early reports of the companies are coming to the DSE. Reports are showing the growth prospect of our economy as bright."
"So, we hope the better days are just ahead of us, there is nothing to be worried about," he said adding that despite various odds such as flood and Sidr, the country's economic growth is impressive, whereas the world economy is in doldrums due to fuel price-hike.
The investors should switch towards stocks based on fundamentals with long term investment goal to avoid further losses in the falling market, he suggested.
Salahuddin said, "The market is going through price correction as the some sectors are over priced. This is the nature of the market. There are both rise and fall in share prices."
He said the bourse has, earlier, warned the investors, particularly small ones, again and again that the market was becoming overvalued.
"Now, they are paying the price of their wrong decisions," he said adding that unfortunately some investors have been affected mainly due to mutual fund rules revision.
Referring to India and Pakistan stock exchanges, the CEO of the DSE said, "These markets also have been big correction in recent time but their markets is normal."
"We hope the investors will learn from their mistakes," he said.
Titu, a retail investor, said, "I have lost 40 per cent of my total investment in the last one month." He blamed the frequent policy change of the market regulator and the price cooling measures for the loss of his capital.
The DGEN tumbled 45 points to close at 2764.53, the lowest since October last year when it was 2762.37.
The two other market barometers -- All Shares Price Index (DSI) and DSE-20 Index (DS20), blue chips also fell 37.84 points and 44.32 points to end at 2415.29 and 2541.45 respectively.
The continuous fall of the market has made the investors panicky and unnerved, sending the market into the negative territory, according to the stock brokers.
The total turnover declined to Tk 3.11 billion against previous day's Tk 4.06 billion.
The losers outshined the gainers as out of 226 issues traded, 63 gained, 153 declined and 10 remained unchanged. The total market capitalisation came down to Tk 942.56 billion from Tk 954.33 billion previously as well.
Not a single share of the Rupali Bank Limited that resumed trading after over eight months Sunday, was traded for the third consecutive day.
The Square Pharma was the top turnover leader with shares worth Tk 320.87 million traded, followed by ACI 254.17 million, Beximco Pharma Tk 250.75 million and UCBL 217.85 million changing hands.
BATBC, Keya Cosmetics, Lanka Bangla Finance, Beximco Pharma, Islami Bank and Apex Adelchi were the other top turnover leaders.
Stock prices of the Sandhani Insurance had the biggest fall of 34.25 per cent, followed by Beximco Fisheries 19.65 per cent, Shinepukur Holdings Limited 11.65 per cent, Square Pharma 11.28 per cent and Apex Tannery 11.15 per cent.
Share prices of the state-run gas distribution company Titas rose 0.23 per cent to close at Tk 318.75 per share.
In its 15th trading day, 199,700 shares out of total 2,141,728 were sold on both the stock exchanges - DSE and CSE, according to the ICB, the sales agent. The company will have to offload around 8.5 million shares in 30 trading days since its debut as per regulations.
BD Thai, 6th ICB, BATBC, ICB Islamic, Rahman Chemical, Bata Shoes, TBL were the top gainers on the day.
