Investors' losses piling up as the losing streak continued Wednesday with major bourse's market cap wiped out more than Tk 137 billion in 11 straight sessions.
The market capitalisation of the Dhaka Stock Exchange (DSE) came down to Tk 3,909 billion on Wednesday, eroding more than 137 billion, from Tk 4,046 billion registered 11 sessions ago on April 26.
Market insiders said the ongoing pessimism coupled with disappointing quarterly earnings results, particularly banks, dented the investors' confidence.
"The institutional investors adopted 'wait-and-see' policy ahead of national budget while some investors tried to leave the market by selling their stakes to avoid further losses, taking the market in the red zone further," said an analyst at a leading brokerage firm.
The Dhaka bourse signed the much-talked-about share purchase agreement with the Chinese consortium on Monday for strategic partner. But, the news failed to make any positive impact on trading yet.
Following the 10 days' price correction, the market opened on negative note and the downward trend continued till end of the session with no sign of reversal. Finally, DSEX fell more than 37 points while CSE All Share Price Index lost 110 points at closing.
DSEX, the prime index of the DSE, went down by 37.13 points or 0.69 per cent to settle at 5,511. DSEX eroded more than 302 points in the past 11 consecutive sessions.
"Disappointing quarterly earnings declarations of some large-cap stocks fuelled up the selling pressure. The selling spree on telecom, cement, textile and bank exacerbated the fall of the indices," commented International Leasing Securities, in its regular market analysis.
The stockbroker noted that some optimistic investor took position on food, fuel & power and engineering sectors' stocks.
The two other indices also ended lower. The DS30 index, comprising blue chips, fell 16.57 points or 0.79 per cent to finish at 2,055 while the DSE Shariah index lost 9.69 point or 0.74 per cent to settle at 1,291.
The trading activities remained low as the total turnover on the major bourse stood at Tk 3.95 billion, which was 11 per cent higher than the previous day's turnover of Tk 3.55 billion.
The investors' activity was mostly focused on engineering, pharmaceuticals and textile, grabbing 19 per cent, 15 per cent and 14 per cent respectively.
Prices of 66 per cent traded issues declined as out of 339 issues traded, 223 closed lower, 71 ended higher and 45 issues remained unchanged on the DSE trading floor.
According to EBL Securities, the investors spurred their selling pressure, especially from telecommunication, pharmaceuticals and banking sectors.
Telecommunication sector posted the highest loss of 2.23 per cent, as the sector's heavyweight Grameenphone's share price fell 2.29 per cent alone, followed by pharmaceuticals with 0.53 per cent and banking 0.52 per cent.
On the other hand, food & allied posted the highest gain of 1.24 per cent, followed by power with 0.72 per cent and engineering 0.18 per cent.
Western Marine Shipyard topped the DSE turnover chart for the fifth straight day with shares worth nearly Tk 224 million changing hands, closely followed by United Power, Bangladesh Steel Re-rolling Mills, Beximco and Square Pharmaceuticals.
Monno Jute Stafflers was the day's highest gainer, posting a gain of 6.25 per cent while Eastland Insurance was the day's worst loser, losing 9.72 per cent.
The port city's bourse Chittagong Stock Exchange (CSE) also ended lower with the CSE All Share Price Index - CASPI - shedding 110 points to settle at 17,017 points and Selective Categories Index - CSCX - losing 65 points to finish at 10,288.
Here too, the losers beat the gainers as 157 issues closed lower, 50 ended higher and 25 remained unchanged on the CSE.
The port city bourse traded 8.48 million shares and mutual fund units worth more than Tk 230 million in turnover.
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