Fresh move to offload shares of 20 SoEs

The government has initiated a fresh move to offload shares of 20 state-owned enterprises (SoEs) in the capital market amid failure of the state entities to do so for the last couple of years, officials said.

Under the move, the Ministry of Finance (MoF) is going to sit with all concerned agencies and other stakeholders on May 05 next to devise a time-bound plan of action for the proposed floatation of shares of the SoEs, they said.

According to officials, the MoF has already asked the authorities of all SoEs to place their detailed progress reports on proposed share floatation.

Besides, the upcoming meeting, according to officials, is expected to set a fresh timeframe for offloading shares of SoEs.

"We will soon sit with chiefs of the SoEs and other stakeholders to review the progress relating to offloading of their shares. This is high time for offloading shares since the bourses are performing well nowadays," a senior MoF official told the FE at the ministry.

The meeting is also expected to give some of the SoEs two to three months' time to complete the process, an official said.

The renewed move has come after years of initiatives taken by the government regarding floatation of shares of some 20 SoEs had hardly any visible progress, competent sources said.

The authorities of the SoEs concerned missed deadlines several times, which they pledged earlier to the government for floating shares of their respective organisations, a senior MoF official close to the initiative told the FE.

Taking note of the prevailing delay in the share floatation of the SoEs, former chairman of the Bangladesh Securities and Exchange Commission (BSEC) AB Mirza Azizul Islam said the government could have done the same much earlier for betterment of the country's stock market.

"Due to bureaucratic tangle, the government could not float SoEs' shares in the market despite repeated suggestions from experts and the stock market investors," Mr. Azizul Islam, who was also a former adviser to the caretaker government, told the FE.

He also said if the profit-making state-owned entities offload their shares, then it would certainly help make the country's capital market vibrant to some extent.

Officials and market analysts, however, said the debacle in the country's stock market from December 2010 until mid- 2012 forced the authorities to put the SoEs' share floatation initiative on hold.

According to them, it is the high time to offload shares of the SoEs because the present trend in capital market is not so frustrating.

Enlistment of 20 SoEs with the country's bourses will help promote the local stock market, they mentioned.

Meanwhile, the government decided to offload its stake in different companies in the stock market in 2010 when the market was bullish, MoF officials said.