Nitol Insurance price jumps 84 per cent in two weeks

Share prices of listed insurance companies continued to soar with eight of the top 10 in the gainers' list coming from the insurance sector last week.
The share price of Nitol Insurance jumped 84 per cent or Tk 30.70 each in the just two weeks to close at Tk 67.20 on Thursday. Its share price was Tk 36.50 two weeks back on September 8.
During the week that ended on Thursday, with eight of the top 10 in the gainers' list coming from the insurance sector.
The week's top eight gainers are Federal Insurance, which gained 41.57 per cent, followed by Rupali Insurance with 36.21 per cent, Nitol Insurance 33.33 per cent, Purabi General 31.53 per cent, Rupali Life 27.84 per cent, Sandhani Life 24.90 per cent, Fareast Islami Life 22.71 per cent and Delta Life Insurance gained 22.09 per cent.
The life insurance sector witnessed 15 per cent gain while general insurance sector soared 11 per cent last week.
The general insurance sector also dominated the turnover board capturing 25 per cent of the week's total turnover.
Rupali Insurance, Nitol Insurance, Purabi General and Rupali Life also featured in the week's top 10 turnover list.
Market analysts said the investors mostly focused on insurance companies' shares in recent weeks riding on the securities regulator's ultimatum on ensuring mandatory shareholding rules.
The Bangladesh Securities and Exchange Commission (BSEC) last week also waived 26 insurance companies from the rules of mandatory capital raising of minimum Tk 300 million through fixed price method of initial public offering.
The stock market regulator made the decision following a proposal of Insurance Development and Regulatory Authority to seek exemption from the minimum capital raising rules of the BSEC.
As per the public issue rules, company must raise at least Tk 300 million under the fixed price method of IPO.
A BSEC official said most of the 26 companies had small paid-up capital and could not float 30 million shares after maintaining 30 per cent of joint mandatory shareholding rules.
In September last year, Finance Minister AHM Mustafa Kamal warned that licences of unlisted insurance companies would be cancelled if they do not get listed on the share market within three months.
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